Deficiency and Delinquency: An Interpretation of Mental TestingMiner, James Burt
Science
Deficiency and Delinquency: An Interpretation of Mental Testing
Miner, James Burt
Children with mental disabilities; Juvenile delinquents; Mentally ill offenders; Psychological tests
“Every feeble-minded person is a potential criminal,” says Goddard in
his work on _Feeble-Mindedness_ (_112_, 514), and this sentiment finds
an echo in the emotions of many social workers. On the other hand we
have the careful work of Bronner in which she compares by their test
records a group of delinquent women with groups selected from night
classes and the servant class who had never been known to be immoral. On
the average she finds that the delinquents do not test below her servant
group. She says:
“Thus, though our delinquents are not as capable as their sisters, many
of them from congested districts, who in other ways are proving
themselves ambitious [the group from night classes,] yet they are no
less equipped intellectually than others who are earning a livelihood
and caring for themselves without coming in conflict with the law in the
least. Whatever their mental status might be, measured by other means,
the fact remains that there is no _necessary_ correlation between their
immoral or criminal tendencies and their intellectual ability and that
others, no more endowed than they, are fighting life's battles without
manifesting the same immoral or criminal tendencies” (_112_, p. 43).
What portion of these moral household servants of equal ability with the
delinquents may later fall under temptation, we, of course, cannot say.
Neither can we say that any of the delinquents would test deficient,
since we do not know the border lines of deficiency with the tests which
were used. The conclusion, however, is clear that, if corresponding
grades of intellect may be delinquent or not at maturity, we must be
cautious in assuming that the lowest grades of intellects would all
become delinquent if not under supervision.
What chances we are running by allowing feeble-minded individuals to be
abroad might be determined if we could find out the probability of
tested deficients becoming delinquent. This question cannot be answered
by showing for a single year or a period of years that crimes are
relatively more common among the defective classes, although such
figures give some impression of the danger of deficiency to the
community.
Kinberg, for example, calculates that in Sweden during the years
1901-1907 murder was relatively 200 times as common as among those not
in institutions, but lacking criminal responsibility through insanity or
deficiency, as among those who were responsible, arson was 72.5 as
common, manslaughter 12.63 times, other injuries to property than arson
6.55, rape 6.1 times, infanticide 4.59 times, larceny 0.99 times, and
fraud 0.26 times (_132_). The data were based upon the reports of the
Royal College of Health which makes the diagnosis as to criminal
responsibility that is required for all cases in which this question
arises. Such examinations, it is estimated, miss at least 15% of the
deficient criminals.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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