Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T00:30:56.331Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Inheritance of Neuroticism: A Reply

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2018

H. J. Eysenck
H. J. Eysenck*
Affiliation:
Institute of Psychiatry, University of London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

This is a reply to a critique by Karon and Saunders (9) of the Eysenck and Prell work on the inheritance of neuroticism (6). This paper is a curious combination of sophisticated statistical analysis and argument by irrelevant association. Thus the authors mention the fact that we found a strong heredity predisposition but go on to say that “the results are so much at variance with general clinical experience that doubts arise in the minds of many psychologists … particularly those who have investigated, in a therapeutic situation, the source and development of neurotic reactions”. The authors do not indicate how it is possible through general clinical experience or in the therapeutic situation, to find an answer to one of the most difficult and complex problems in the whole field of psychology. Whether neurotic predisposition is largely inherited or has little hereditary basis, would not seem to be capable of being discerned simply by giving psychotherapy to a few neurotics.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Journal of Mental Science , Volume 105 , Issue 438 , January 1959 , pp. 76 - 80
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1959 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Connor, D. V., “The Effect of Temperamental Traits on Group Intelligence Performance of Children”. 1953. London Ph.D. Thesis.Google Scholar
2. Eysenck, H. J., “Criterion Analysis: An Application of the Hypothetico-Deductive Method to Factor Analysis”, Psychol. Rev., 1950, 57, 38–65.Google Scholar
3. Eysenck, H. J., The Scientific Study of Personality, 1952. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
4. Eysenck, H. J., Dynamics of Anxiety and Hysteria, 1957. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
5. Eysenck, H. J., Granger, G., and Brengelmann, H., Perceptual Processes and Mental Disorder, 1957. London: Chapman and Hall.Google Scholar
6. Eysenck, H. J., and Prell, D. B., “The Inheritance of Neuroticism. An Experimental Study”, J. ment. Sci., 1951, 97, 441–465.Google Scholar
7. Eysenck, H. J., and Prell, D. B., “A Note on the Differentiation of Normal and Neurotic Children by Means of Objective Tests”, J. clin. Psychol., 1952, 8, 202–204.Google Scholar
8. Himmelweit, H., and Petrie, A., “The Measurement of Personality in Children”, Brit. J. educ. Psychol., 1951, 21, 9–29 Google Scholar
9. Karon, D. P., and Saunders, D. Q., “Some Implications of the Eysenck-Prell Study of The Inheritance of Neuroticism’: A Critique”, J. ment. Sci., 1958, 104, 350–358.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
10. May, J., “Note on the Assumption Underlying Holzinger's h2 Statistic”, J. ment. Sci., 1951, 97, 466–467.Google Scholar
11. Newman, H. H., Freeman, F. N., and Holzinger, K. J., Twins: A Study of Heredity and Environment, 1937. Chicago. Univ. Press.Google Scholar
12. Shields, J., “Twins Brought Up Apart”, Eugenics Rev., 1958, 50, 115–123.Google Scholar
13. Thorpe, J. G., and James, D. P., “Neuroticism in Children. I. An Investigation of Normal and Neurotic Group Differences”, Brit. J. Psychol., 1957, 48, 26–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.