This study is part of a still incomplete long-term study of all members of the families of sixteen schizophrenic patients. All the patients were in a private psychiatric hospital for an extended period; all members of each family were interviewed repeatedly.

Few, perhaps none, of the fathers of these patients filled the paternal role expected in middle and upper-class families; many harmed the structure of the family and the rearing of the children. These fathers were tentatively divided into three approximate groups: 1. Fathers of schizophrenic daughters, constantly in battle with wives who did not fulfil their rigid, distorted expectations, who struggled to get their daughters to adopt their behavior, while preventing their wives from being effective mothers. 2. Fathers who could not endure the rivalry of sons for their wives' attention and impeded the wives' efforts at mothering while derogating the sons. 3. Passive fathers, nonentities in the home, who did not fulfil their wives' ideal of a male and furnished little acceptable example for their sons to follow.