hrbuch der Gerichtlichen Psychiatrie." 1912.

[5] SANDER: Quoted by White. "Outlines of Psychiatry." Fourth Edition.

CHAPTER IV

THE MALINGERER: A CLINICAL STUDY

I

The following study is undertaken less for the purpose of discussing the
psychology of malingering than with the object in view of illustrating
by means of clinical records the type of individual who malingers. The
opinion is a general one that malingering is a form of mental reaction
to which certain individuals resort in their effort to adjust themselves
to a difficult situation of life. Being a form of human behavior, it
should have been approached, therefore, with the same attitude of mind
as any other type of behavior.

A perusal, however, of the literature on the subject, especially of the
contributions of the older writers, reveals that with certain isolated
exceptions the subject was viewed primarily from the standpoint of the
moralist. Even today one sees in certain quarters a good deal
made--certainly a great deal more than the facts would justify--of the
"insanity dodge" in criminal cases. It is true that today,
notwithstanding the still broadly prevalent tendency to view with
suspicion every mental disorder which becomes manifested in connection
with the commission of crime, the danger of error in this respect has
been reduced to a minimum owing to the more advanced stage of
psychiatry, and therefore the practical importance of the subject of
malingering is not so great as it was formerly. We find, nevertheless,
justification for the further study of this subject in the fact that,
aside from its purely psychiatric importance, the more intensive study
of the malingerer offers a solution for some of the important problems
in criminology. As one of the results of this more intensive study may
be mentioned the gradually-gained conviction that malingering and actual
mental disease are not only not mutually exclusive phenomena in the same
individual, but that malingering itself is a form of mental reaction
manifested almost exclusively by those of an inferior mental make-up;
that is, by individuals concerning whom there must always be
considerable doubt as to the degree of responsibility before the law. As
a result of this recognition cases of pure malingering in individuals
absolutely normal mentally are becoming rarer every day in psychiatric
experience.

The conviction was further gained that malingering as well as lying and
decei