In groups spontaneously formed on the childrens' wards at Bellevue Psychopathic Hospital, it has been noted that younger children seek protection in the group, while preadolescents seek status and communal support for their defiant attitude to authority. Group sexual activities among both younger and older boys seem to serve hostile rather than object-libidinal purposes; they are often reactions to confinement, which is construed either as a rejection, a proof of status, or a punishment which relieves guilt. In the type of delinquent who steals to relieve his sexual guilt, sexual activity during confinement may represent the relative instinctual freedom after a need for punishment has been appeased by incarceration. On the basis of these observations, Dr. Rosenthal has developed a rapid diagnostic technique which is the subject of this report. In order to preserve the continuity of a group long enough