CHILD HYGIENE IN HUMAN ECOLOGY 349 



were probably carriers of mental abnormality. There is the psychiatrist 

 who says that mental abnormality is so general and so frequently exogenous 

 that we should search for the carrier both in family stock and social setting. 



Preventive work among these carriers, wherever they be found, must be 

 preceded by a more intensive study of the physical, social, and economic, 

 factors associated with the development of the psychoses. We must remove 

 such factors from their environment in the interest of human ecology. 



The study of physical factors should include further consideration of the 

 relation of physical defects and physical illness to mental diseases, glandular 

 dysfunction, and possible biochemical disturbances. We know the rela- 

 tionship between the thyroid gland and cretinism, and it has been suggested 

 that some insanity has an endocrine basis. The whole subject needs further 

 study. 



The racial factor in mental hygiene cannot be ignored. Pollock and 

 Malzberg have shown that the expectation of mental disease is considerably 

 higher among the foreign-born than among native American stock. We do 

 not know definitely why this is so, and can only infer that probably environ- 

 mental factors play the dominant part. 



The compilation of family pedigrees may discover many unsuspected 

 carriers as well as cases, and it is to be hoped that this work will increase in 

 volume. But it is slow work and it is more practicable to apply preventive 

 measures in mental hygiene to the whole population. Prevention should 

 undoubtedly begin in childhood, and the researches of the eugenicists, ecolo- 

 gists, psychiatrists, physicians, surgeons and all other scientists in related 

 fields will provide us with our armamentarium. If we are to provide an 

 environment that will stimulate favorable reactions between the organism 

 and the environment we should begin with the baby at birth. The Child- 

 Guidance Clinic takes the child that is already developing symptoms and 

 attempts to abort the attack. We should not wait till symptoms appear if 

 we are to empty the insane hospitals of the future. If it is true, as has been 

 said, that in the long run nature evolves types to suit environments, child 

 hygiene may have a share in bringing about a desirable evolution. 



