The Colony and the Young High-Grade Mental Defective

aPpears to score highly above many uncouth labourers outside the colony. His behaviour and appearance are, however, deceiving and he very likely turns out to be an illiterate and to have in the vast majority of cases subnormal niental capacity. However, neither his illiteracy nor his low mental efficiency would justify his detention in an institution were it not for his apparent inability to look after himself and to keep out of trouble. Thus, not intellectual lnferiority by itself but only its combination with social inefficiency, lead to the internment of high&rade mental defectives, who might, but for their Cental instability, be useful members of society. It is still not quite clear why one feebleminded Person should succeed in society and be no trouble to social agencies, whilst the other has to be kept constantly behind institution walls. However, it has increasingly been recognized ln recent years that emotional maladjustment Plays a great, if not decisive part in the feebleminded person's failure in society and that intellectual inferiority should be considered only ?n aggravating factor in many cases. Whilst 1ntellectual inferiority is held to be irremediable, Maladjustment is definitely often accessible to treatment, though success or failure may largely depend on the intellectual factor. Considering, therefore, the problem of the young high-grade defective as one of treatment ?f maladjustment rather than one of custodial care, new avenues of research and therapy open UPIf we are able to treat that maladjustment successfully, the " turnover " of patients in a colony may be considerably increased above the Present level, because we shall then achieve earlier and more lasting successes, and the colony will then approximate more nearly to the function of a " mental hospital " aiming at rehabilitation of the patient than is the case at present. The question arises how far the average presentday colony can assist in the first exploratory steps and whether the " colony idea" is capable of such organizational alterations as may prove necessary for a specially designed therapeutic programme for only a limited