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This monograph, to which four investigators contributed, presents certain results obtained in the course of multidisciplinary research by the Division of Neuropsychiatry of the Institute of Research of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The objectives of the study concern the principles and the effectiveness of milieu therapy in an army hospital for patients suffering from their first schizophrenic episode. The course of the sickness as well as the symbolic meaning of various symptoms are considered in the light of modern concepts of communication. The ego of the patient, cut off from communication with his milieu, resorts to the device of symptom-formation in order to re-establish communication. The distortion of communication is founded on a distorted picture of environment, the basis for which has been laid down by the patient's individual history.
The point of view which considers the symptom as a communicative device in transactions between the patient and others is confirmed by minute observations of patients who could be followed up in the well-controlled setting of a military hospital. In many instances, the symptoms of the schizophrenic are considered as 'rejection-courting