186 DISEASES DUE TO MALADJUSTMENT 



volitional muscular acts are carried on, an injury which 

 again results in paralysis. 



Impairment Due to Alteration of Normal Metabo- 

 lism. — The higher brain functions, namely, association, 

 volition, appreciation (as of art or literature), the faculty 

 of reason, which is the highest development of the prop- 

 erty of association, the feelings or emotions, the condi- 

 tion of consciousness or awareness, all accompany and in 

 all probability depend on the functional metabolism in 

 the higher nerve-cells. It follows that alterations in this 

 metabolism are likely to result in perversions of these 

 high mental functions. On account of the delicacy and 

 complexity of the nervous interactions which constitute 

 mental functioning, a slight disturbance of metabolism 

 may and frequently does lead to marked departure from 

 normal mental and emotional activity, and such disturb- 

 ance is likely to manifest itself in turn in alterations in 

 bodily functioning. Conditions in which this situation 

 prevails to a marked degree are familiar to medical prac- 

 titioners and are grouped under the general name of 

 hysteria. — The chief characteristics of this condition 

 are: first an enhancement of the bodily effects of emotion, 

 so that violent outbursts of joy, sorrow, or anger result 

 from trivial causes ; and second a loss of the sense of pro- 

 portion in making associations, so that factors which to a 

 normal individual are either of minor importance or are 

 deemed unworthy of inclusion in the associative process 

 are exaggerated by the hysteric to become of supreme im- 

 portance. When one recalls that the use of associated 

 memory as a guide to conduct will evidently cause those 

 associations which appear most important to take first 

 place in the regulation of conduct, it is clear that this 

 exaggeration of minor or unworthy associations, with the 

 accompanying minimizing of really important memories, 

 is bound to lead to departures from normal behavior. 



Neurasthenia is the technical name of a condition 

 commonly called nervous prostration. It is another con- 



