Citation

Milton H. Erickson. Am. J. Sociol. 1931; 36(5): 758-769.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1931, University of Chicago Press)

DOI

10.1086/215534

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

A total of 1,500 adult white married male criminals in Wisconsin were selected. These included 170 cases of abandonment, of which 35 per cent were feeble-minded although the feeble-minded constituted only 18.2 per cent of all criminals. Relatively, 22.3 per cent of the feeble-minded committed abandonment as compared with 8.88 per cent of the non-feeble-minded. The degree of feeble-mindedness was essentially without import. Subjective cause for delinquency in abandonment cases were essentially economic distress and ill-health, with liquor playing far less part in these case than in other offenses. Family size appears to constitute a factor in abandonment, with the larger families occurring more frequently among the feeble-minded. World War service, conjugal incompatibility, and individual poverty constitute factors in both abandonment and crime. The disruption of the childhood home of the individual appears to lead directly to the production of social unfits. The foreign born feeble-minded contribute 230 to 245 per cent of their proportion of crime as determined by population ratios.