TABOO AND GENETICS 215 



point to seek other outlets are too complex to 

 be explained on the basis of conditioned reflex 

 responses. All that we can say at present is 

 that too great emotional pressure is drained 

 off through whatever channel environmental 

 and hereditary factors make possible. (8). 

 This vicarious mode of expression may become 

 habitual, however, and interfere with a return 

 to natural activities in a manner analogous to 

 that in which the development of the erotic 

 fetish often prevents the normal reaction to the 

 original stimulus. 



Because the conditioned emotional reactions 

 and substitutions of vicarious motor outlets 

 take place at neurological and physiological 

 levels outside the realm of consciousness, they 

 are called unconscious activities of the organism. 

 There are many other unconscious factors which 

 also modify the sex life of the human individual. 

 The most fundamental of these are the impres- 

 sions and associations of the infancy period, 

 which may well be classed as conditioned reflex 

 mechanisms, but are sufficiently important to 

 receive separate consideration. 



It is generally conceded by students of child 

 psychology that the social reactions of the child 

 are conditioned by the home environment in 

 which the earliest and most formative years of 

 its life are passed. It is not surprising, there- 

 fore, that the ideal of the opposite sex which 



