The health and occupational adequacy of the mentally deficient.

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Abstract
1832 selectees rejected for failure to meet the minimum mental and literacy standards at the Boston Armed Forces Induction Station were studied for physical defects. Of these, 600 were especially investigated as to social and economic adjustment, with the aim of discovering the social adequacy of mental defectives, especially at the moron level. These groups were compared with a control group selected from 1000 random medical records, and with another control group of 60,000 cases from a study of the major causes of rejection in all selectees. An analysis of the age, wt., posture and height of the mentally unfit showed no significant difference between them and a control series. The defectives had slightly better teeth than the controls, although on the basis of the number of fillings, there seemed to be inferior reparative dental care among defectives. Of those rejected for mental deficiency, 3.7% had disqualifying eye defects as against 2.8% for all selectees of the same period. Similarly, 2.8% of the mentally deficient were rejected for chronic, suppura-tive otitis media, and 1.4% for perforated ear drums, as against a comparative frequency of 2.1% and 1.1% respectively, among controls. Hence, the deficient group is not distinguished to any great extent, from the normal in respect to sensory defects. There was an even lower-than-normal incidence of rheumatic heart disease, hernia, tuberculosis, peptic ulcer, and neurocirculatory asthenia among the mentally defective group. All of these findings tend to contradict an assumption long accepted in many quarters that the mentally deficient are usually physically deficient as well. On the psychiatric side, psychopathic personality and psycho-neurosis were the two main causes for rejection among the mentally unfit. Although the defective had been arrested and jailed more than the control group, this difference was not so great as some, of the earlier studies describing the "menace" of the mentally defective would indicate. The finding of a high rate of psychoneurosis among this group is another unexpected deviation, for many writers have considered mental defectives less susceptible to neuroses. Certainly, the chief difference between the mentally unfit and the control series was in educational level, the defective possessing, on the avg., only a 6th grade education, the controls, on the average, completing high school. About 95% of the defectives were employed at the time of induction. To a greater extent than normally they were engaged in manual, semi-skilled, and unskilled labor, but in terms of dollars and cents they were earning a respectable living. They showed both a sense of social responsibility and economic sufficiency in that the number of people they supported on their income was the same as for the control group. The total impression in regard to occupational adequacy is that, although the defective is unemployed more often in depression years and is more likely to be assisted by the WPA, CCC and other governmental agencies than a man of normal intelligence, in times of avg., or better than avg., prosperity he can be socially and economically adequate.

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