important account that the psychopathologist's place in criminology is
fully justified. In endeavoring to aid in the solution of the problem of
criminology, the psychopathologist need not seek new methods of
procedure but may safely rely upon those which have aided him in
elucidating in a very large measure the problem of mental disease. For
criminology is an integral part of psychopathology, crime is a type of
abnormal conduct which expresses a failure of proper adjustment at the
psychological level.
It was not until the advent of the Kraepelinian School of psychiatry,
with its intensive search for facts and the resultant more accurate
delineation and classification of types of mental disorder, that we
began to acquire real insight into psychopathology and were enabled to
render more accurate prognoses. This more or less purely descriptive
method of study is at present being followed by an intensive analysis of
the facts thus gained as exemplified in the present psychoanalytic
movement. It is conceded by all thoughtful observers that criminology
will have to follow the same route on its way to final solution. The
series of studies here presented reflect an effort in this direction. It
is aimed to present a series of well-rounded-out case histories of
criminal types as studied from the psychopathologist's viewpoint, and in
one instance, at least, an attempt is made at an accurate and intensive
psychological analysis of the biological forces which were at the bottom
of a career of habitual stealing. No attempt is made at hard and fast
formulations. Our knowledge concerning the criminal is still too meager
to justify one in drawing dependable conclusions. But it is felt that
this clinical material emphasizes sufficiently the necessity of the
psychopathological mode of approach to the problem of criminology. For
that matter, the excellent work being carried on by Dr. William Healy in
connection with the Chicago Juvenile Court and by psychopathologists in
a number of other cities attests that this need is being gradually
recognized by society. One desires only to express the hope that the
time is not far distant when our penal and reformatory institutions will
likewise serve the purpose of clinics for the study of the delinquent,
and that such clinical instruction will form part of the curriculum of
at least every public prosecutor.
I desire to express my indebtedness to Messrs. Lea and Febiger, the
J. B. Lippincott Co., and to the editors of the American Journal of
Insanity, and the Journal of the American Institute of Criminal Law and
Criminology, for their kind permission to reprint some of the material
herein presented.
Before concluding this preface I desire to avail myself of this
opportunity of expressing my sincere gratitude to Dr. William A. White,
Superintendent of the Government Hospital for the Insane, for his kind
and very stimulating advice and encouragement which made these studies
possible.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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