Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T08:34:47.715Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The Couvade Syndrome

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

W. H. Trethowan
Affiliation:
University of Birmingham
M. F. Conlon
Affiliation:
All Saints Hospital, Birmingham; From the Department of Psychiatry, The University of Birmingham

Extract

Pregnancy in their wives is known to precipitate mental illness in some husbands (Zilboorg, 1931; Freeman, 1951; Towne and Afterman, 1955). But the fact that it may more commonly cause physical symptoms seems never to have been fully investigated, and has only occasionally been reported in the medical press.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1965 

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

Any Questions? (1952). Brit. med. J., ii, 454.Google Scholar
Arieti, S. (1959). American Handbook of Psychiatry. Vol. I. New York: Basic Books, Inc. p. 482.Google Scholar
Boehm, F. (1930). “The femininity complex in man.” Int. J. Psychoanalysis, 11, 456.Google Scholar
Clyne, M. D. (1964). “Thirty-seconds psychotherapy.” Med. World, 100, 9.Google Scholar
Crawley, E. (1927). The Mystic Rose. A Study of Primitive Marriage and of Primitive Thought. Vol. 2. London: Methuen & Co. pp. 177188.Google Scholar
Curtis, J. L. (1955). “A psychiatric study of 55 expectant fathers.” U.S. Armed Forces Med. J., 6, 937.Google Scholar
Dally, P. J., and Mullins, A. G. (1954). “A mysterious pain.” Brit. med. J., ii, 757.Google Scholar
Dawson, W. R. (1929). The Custom of Couvade. Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Dekker, T., and Webster, J. (1607). Westward Ho. The Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker (ed. Bowers, F., 1955). Cambridge University Press. p. 329.Google Scholar
Encyclopaedia Britannica (1959). Couvade. Vol. 6. p. 614.Google Scholar
Evans, W. N. (1951). “Simulated pregnancy in a male.” Psychoanalyt. Quart., 20, 165178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frazer, J. G. (1910). Totemism and Exogamy. Vol. 4. London. p. 245.Google Scholar
Freeman, T. (1951). “Pregnancy as a precipitant of mental illness in men.” Brit. J. Med. Psychol., 24, 49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freeman, T., Cameron, J. L., and McGhie, A. (1958). Chronic Schizophrenia. London: Tavistock Publ. Ltd., p. 109.Google Scholar
Hunter, R., and Macalpine, I. (1963). Three Hundred Tears of Psychiatry. London: O.U.P. p. 207.Google Scholar
Jacobs, B. (1943). “Aetiological factors and reaction types in psychoses following childbirth.” J. Ment. Sci., 89, 242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, E. (1942). “Psychology and childbirth.” Lancet, i, 695.Google Scholar
Licht, H. (1935). Sexual Life in Ancient Greece. London: Routledge & Sons, Ltd. p. 522.Google Scholar
Malinowski, B. (1937). Sex and Repression in Savage Society. London: Kegan Paul. p. 285.Google Scholar
Moore, L. H. G. (1952). “The Couvade.” Brit. med. J., ii, 677.Google Scholar
Murray, Margaret (1921). The God of the Witches. London: Sampson Low. p. 145.Google Scholar
Noyes, A. P., and Kolb, L. C. (1963). Modern Clinical Psychiatry. 6th edition. Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders, Co. p. 44.Google Scholar
Pennant, T. (1772). ‘A tour in Scotland and voyage to the Hebrides.’ Quoted by Frazer, J. G. Totemism and Exogamy, loc. cit. Google Scholar
Piaget, J. (1930). The Child's Conception of Physical Causality. London: Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Reik, T. (1931). Ritual. London: The Hogarth Press. p. 27.Google Scholar
Rolleston, J. D. (1945). “The folk-lore of toothache.” Brit. Dent. J., 78, 225, 257.Google Scholar
Simpson, James Sir (1872). Clinical Lectures on Diseases of Women. Edinburgh: A. & C. Black. p. 363.Google Scholar
Towne, R. D., and Afterman, J. (1955). “Psychosis in males related to parenthood.” Bull. Menninger Clin., 19, 19.Google Scholar
Tylor, E. B. (1865). Researches into the Early History of Mankind and the Development of Civilization. 2nd edition. London: John Murray. p. 301.Google Scholar
Wessel, M. A. (1963). “The prenatal pediatric visit.” Pediatrics, 32, 926.Google Scholar
Westermarck, E. (1921). The History of Human Marriage. 3rd edition. Vol. I, London: Macmillan. p. 287.Google Scholar
Zilboorg, G. (1931). “Depressive reactions related to parenthood.” Amer. J. Psychiat., 10, 927962.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.