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determined the timing of a-breakdown. With regardto war, Stott predicts from his data a fairly rapiddecline in cases attributable to the actual events andconditions of war-time, though this forecast could notbe taken to include cases due to the social and emotionalfactors on which war was engrafted, and which have inpart persisted in the " cold " war. The average Raventest score for the group was 40, corresponding to the36th percentile. Frank psychosis was not widespread,though some of the recorded cases show a curious

pseudoschizophrenic reaction which is more familiarin older delinquents.The most urgent problem in modern criminology is that

of identifying the offender whose delinquency is com-

pulsive at his- first offence-that is, to pick out the recurr-’ ing decimal. The anger of judges and moralists whenthe term " neurotic " is used in connection with

delinquency cannot withstand the enormous body ofevidence, both in this report and in general experience,which shows that while some crimes result from impulseor greed, the entire body of repeated and persistentcrime arises as an inappropriate form of behaviourwhich gratifies an unconscious and irrational need in thecriminal. This observation fits exactly into Horney’sdefinition of a neurosis ; over the wider issue, Stottremarks that " the moralist and the psychologist caneat grass together. In our present society we cannotafford the luxury of endlessly tolerating neurotic ways oflife, delinquent or otherwise.... [But] the undiscrimina-ting philosophy of a self determination has outgrown itsusefulness when it insists on the ability of the psycho-path to adjust himself unaided to life, and inflicts onhim term after term of imprisonment in the vain hopethat this will prove a deterrent."

At the present time a remarkable amount of ill-informed and ignorant comment on juvenile crime is

being made by prominent people. It is important,-there-fore, that studies such as this-presented with humourand insight, from a wide general culture, and wholly freefrom emotional bias-should reach the general public.The Carnegie Foundation would do well to issue thisreport far outside its present envisaged circulation tolibraries and interested individuals. It is a cheeringdocument, and its title is well chosen, for it strengthensthe humanist conviction that conduct is comprehensibleeven when it is not understood, and that we are withinsight of an extension to human misconduct of the sameepistemological and systematic method which hasenabled us to control infectious disease. Mr. Stott is

fully aware of these implications, and treats them at alevel which will satisfy the philosopher as well as thepsychiatrist. He deserves the support of all those, insideand outside psychiatry, who share his awareness.

PSI PHENOMENA AND PSYCHIATRY

Prof. J. B. Rhine, of Duke University, South Carolina,had a crowded audience of psychiatrists and psychologistswhen he lectured on parapsychology in the RoyalSociety of Medicine. Parapsychology, according to

Rhine,! is the science of those mental manifestationsthat appear to transcend recognised principles. " It

attempts to deal scientifically with the problem of man’splace in nature and the relationship of the personalityto the physical world." Professor Rhine credits Mesmerwith having encountered and described both thoughttransference and clairvoyance. He referred to famous

psychiatrists (Ribot, Janet, Freud, and others) who hadreported examples of extrasensory perception. Interestin these phenomena has been growing among psychiatristsand psychologists of late, partly no doubt as the resultof the work carried out in Professor Rhine’s laboratory

1. Rhine, J. B. The Reach of the Mind. London, 1948.

over the last twenty years. A recent inquiry amongAmerican psychiatrists revealed that, of 725 who replied,a quarter believed themselves to have encountered suchphenomena, while 68% thought them worthy of investiga-tion. The term " psi phenomena " was suggestedby Thoulless and Wiesner,2 of Cambridge University.It is applied to both extrasensory perception, or E.S.P.,(the extrasensory influence of mind on mind), andpsychokinesis, or P.K. (the influence of mind on matter).Professor Rhine and others regard both as experi-mentally established beyond doubt, E.s.p. with the helpof card tests, P.K. with dice tests. The technique ofthese methods and the application of the laws of chancein the interpretations of test results are described inProfessor Rhine’s books.

Their methods established, the investigators began tostudy the types of subjects and states of consciousnesslikely to produce demonstrable psi phenomena. Contraryto popular belief, they found no basic connection betweenmental abnormality, in the psychiatric sense, and psiphenomena ; nor was there any indication that emotionalmaladjustment favoured their occurrence. They rathergained the impression that a high degree of emotionaladjustment made for success in their tests, though afew of their media had been of an " excitable tempera-ment." Hypnosis has been found to affect both P.K. andE.s.p., but controlled experiments have so far beeninconclusive as to the kind of changes which thesephenomena undergo in the hypnotic state. Psi phenomenaare functions of the unconscious mind, and failure inexperiments may be due to unconscious

"

negativism,"resulting in large deviations which cannot be explainedmathematically as chance effects. Rhine and his co-

workers confirmed the observations made by Soal andGoldney 3 of the " displacement effect "-the extra-

sensory perception of objects near the target. Therelation of psi phenomena to the functions of the nervoussystem is still unexplored, though a promising start hasbeen made with tests in states following concussion.Urban,4 of Innsbruck, using E.s.p. card tests before andafter electroconvulsant treatment and narco-analysis,found a rise of the scores during a certain phase of

clouding of consciousness ; but his report is based on100 tests only, and his experiments still require confirma-tion. Urban suggested that the emergence of psi pheno-mena was due to the removal of inhibiting mechanisms.Professor Rhine posed the question whether " there maynot have been something in the mind that has beensmothered in the history of evolution." He is inclinedto regard the homing phenomena in animals as basedon E.s.p., and referred to experiments which to him madethis assumption almost inescapable. The. " vestigialtheory " of the psi phenomena has many adherents

among parapyschologists. Professor Rhine regards thesephenomena as a challenge to our psychological andphilosophical concepts : do they not force us back fromour unitary concept of the mind-body relationship, heasks, to a dualistic conception of man ? We must choosebetween a mind-centred (psychocentric) and a brain-centred (cerebrocentric) conception. Although heowned to being cautious and open to correction, he leftno doubt where his sympathies lay, and he was supportedby Mr. Thoulless who also felt that parapyschologyseemed to be pointing to the old idea that soul ruledthe body. According to present-day psychologicaltheory, psi phenomena should not take place ; but theydo. Psychological theories, Mr. Thoulless said, musttake account of parapsychological facts.5 Other speakersreported on psi phenomena from their own experience.2. Thoulless, R. H., Wiesner, B. P. Proc. Soc. psych. Res.

1947, 58.3. Soal, S. G., Goldney, K. M, Ibid, 1943, 47.4. Urban, H. Festschrift für Pötzl. Innsbruck, 1949.5. Thoulless, R. H. Brit. J. Psychol. 1949, 39, 97.

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Doubts on the mathematics of Rhine’s experiments wereexpressed by one speaker : was it not possible, he asked,that some of the test results were due to a coincidence

of a bias of the experimental subject with a bias of thematerial. Another speaker inquired where parapsycho-logy ends and mysticism starts. Professor Rhine isconfident that he is guided only by the logic of scientificprocedure ; and he is fully aware that he is working ondangerous ground. " This is a jungle.... We are

frightened of the danger of making a false step."YOUNG PEOPLE WORKING IN HOSPITALS

HOSPITAL cadet -schemes and other unofficial pre-nursing courses designed to bridge the gap betweenschool-leaving and admission of student nurses to train-ing, are multiplying, with the result that more younggirls between the ages of 15 and 18 are finding their wayinto the hospitals. In one way this is a good thing :an early wish to become a nurse is often lost in thoseintervening years, not because the enthusiasm is insincereor romantic but because it is never nourished. If the

girl begins other work she often finds it inconvenientto change later ; whereas if she can do work that hassome links with nursing the training is progressiveand the change-over natural.

Nevertheless, there are serious drawbacks to cadetschemes, as the Minister of Health fully recognises in arecent circular (R.H.B. [50] 37). He is anxious that thework assigned to young people should not be of a typefor which they are unsuited by reason of their age, and-that the conditions should be in keeping with the require-ments of the Factories Acts and the Young Persons(Employment) Act. He has therefore drawn up someconditions of service appropriate to young people, andhas set out types of work which are suitable and unsuit-able for young people to undertake. These conditionsare not laid down as regulations, anyhow for the present,but the Minister expects that hospital authorities willadopt them and put them into force as soon as possible.He thinks that young people under 18 should not be

allowed, in any hospital, to carry out any treatment orto have the care of drugs or to nurse sick people. Theyshould not be employed in any capacity in operating-theatres or mortuaries, or in any way that would

bring them into contact with the sick in homes for thedying, cancer hospitals, or venereal-disease hospitalsor departments ; or in the wards or attached to thewards of mental hospitals or mental-deficiency institu-tions. Nor should they be employed in the radio-

logical, physical-medicine, or outpatient departmentsof mental hospitals, isolation hospitals, tuberculosissanatoria, or in mental-deficiency institutions in

any work which would bring them into contact with

low-grade or difficult patients. For young people underthe age of 17 he proposes some further restrictions :they should not be employed in the X-ray, physical-medicine, or outpatient departments of maternityhospitals, or in hospital reception rooms, or attachedto wards in any type of hospital. This last provisionis particularly sound, taking account as it does of thetuberculosis risk in general wards. The risks of acquiringinfection from the known or suspected case hardlymatter: they can be guarded against. The dangercomes from the early unrecognised case of pulmonarytuberculosis with bacilli in the sputum. There are

always some of these about, as mass radiography hasshown, and adolescents should not deliberately bebrought into contact with them. True, they will meetsuch unrecognised cases in buses and trains, but theydo not as a rule undertake’ small personal services fortheir fellow travellers, or handle objects they havehandled, or spend an hour or two within range of theircoughing. At least one first-aid organisation outside

the hospitals likes to send its cadets into the wardsfor a few hours each week : but much as the youngpeople enjoy and appreciate the experience, they shouldnot be granted it. The fact that most of them keepwell should not weigh against the chance that here andthere one may be infected with a serious disease.The Minister’s list of suitable duties for those between

15 and 18 includes work in diet kitchens, where theyoung people can help to’prepare and serve diets andclean equipment ; in X-ray departments, where theycan help with filing, guide walking patients to otherdepartments, look after linen, help in the dark-room,and play with waiting children; in the physical-medicine department, where they can look after the tele-phone, help to marshal waiting children, dust, clean:equipment, and mend linen ; in the outpatients; thealmoner’s department, the nurses home, and the -lineiiroom, where they can do comparable duties ; in therecords office, and the catering- and steward’s office,where they can help with clerical work. They can alsoact as messengers. Those between 1-7 and 18 can takeon more responsible jobs, helping in the reception roomby taking inquiries and messages, and learning the useof the switchboard ; and on the wards, where they canshare in the general care of the ward kitchens, bath-room, sluice room, sterilising-room and clinical room,clean equipment and cupboards other than. the drugcupboard, help to cut up dressings and pack drums,help to serve meals, lay trays, arrange flowers, and dosimilar light tasks, all of which are specified in thememorandum.The Minister further suggests that the maximum

working hours (exclusive of meal and rest breaks)should be 44 hours a week for people under 16, and 48 forthose of 16 and over, with a maximum of 9 hours in a

day. An additional hour daily may be worked by thoseof 16 and over, provided that only 50 such hours areworked in a year, and that not more than 6 are workedin any week. The maximum span of work, he suggests,should be 11 hours, beginning not earlier than 7 A.M.and ending not later than 8 P.M. (6 P.M. for people under16). The periods suggested for meal-breaks are 45minutes for midday dinner and 30 minutes for tea.These hours, and particularly the span of work, seem tous too long. Night work is to be prohibited, and theremust be a half-holiday and a full day off weekly. Publicholidays, too, are to be allowed.

Hospital authorities should arrange for any youngpeople who work for them to attend part-time coursesfor further education for the equivalent of one full daya week ; and this must not be taken out of the timeoff duty. For those who intend to become nurses thefurther education course should be of a kind to fit themfor their profession. The Ministry of Education will

shortly be asking local education authorities to considerproviding a new type of pre-nursing course, occupyingone day a week for two years, designed to meet theneeds of young people working in hospitals. TheMinister asks hospital authorities to let the educationauthorities know what kind of courses they want, and tohelp the authorities in organising such courses by offeringthem accommodation and equipment and the servicesof lecturers on technical - subjects.

ON May 8 the King visited Sir MORTON SMART inhospital and invested him with the insignia of theG.C.V.O.

THE next session of the General Medical Council willopen on Tuesday, May 23, at 2 P.M., when Dr. DAVIDCAMPBELL, the president, will deliver an address.

Prof. B. P. BABKIN, M.D., of McGill University,Montreal, who was elected F.R.S. earlier this year, diedon May 3, at the age of 73.