According to David Levy, the rejecting mother is defined as 'one whose behavior toward the child is such that she consciously or unconsciously has a desire to be free from the child and considers it a burden'. The authors add a further criterion used by Newell, namely, that the rejection be expressed verbally by the mother. In the allergy group, sixty-two of the sixty-three children (98.4 percent) suffered from maternal rejection; in the nonallergy group, nine of the thirty-seven children (24.3 percent). The critical ratio of the difference in proportions was seen to be significant. Thus it can be said that 'maternal rejection' appears to be an important factor in the personality of the clinically allergic child.