psychology, to attack the obsession and bring him, first
of all, to see and face squarely his own responsibility.

Many blanket theories have been developed to explain desertion--that it
is due to economic pressure; that it is the result of bad housekeeping;
that its causes can all be reduced to sex incompatibility. All these
factors: undoubtedly have their bearing on the problem, but there is no
one cause or group of causes underlying breakdowns in family morale. The
ratio of desertions has been observed to decrease rather than to
increase in "hard times";[8] moreover, it is a matter of common
observation that not all slovenly and incompetent wives are deserted,
and that many married couples in all walks of life whose sex
relationships are unsatisfactory, nevertheless maintain the fabric of
family life and support and bring up their children with an average
degree of success. None of these three factors alone will serve,
therefore, as a fundamental causation unit in desertion. Many
statistical attempts have been made to study the causes of desertion,
and to assign to each its mathematical percentage of influence. The
report of a court of domestic relations gives such an analysis of over
1,500 cases, listing 25 causes, and carefully calculating the percentage
of cases due to each. A summary of these percentages grouped under five
heads is as follows:

_Percentage_
1. Distinct sex factors 39.03
2. Alcohol and narcotic drugs 37.00
3. Temperamental traits 15.40
4. Economic issues 6.27
5. Mental and physical troubles 2.30
------
100.00

It would be easy to criticize the foregoing on the score of grouping.
Can alcoholism and drug addiction be separated from mental and physical
disorders? And how distinguish infallibly between sex factors,
temperamental traits, and mental disabilities? But the main defect in
such statistical studies is that they assume in each case one cause, or
at least one cause sufficiently dominant to dwarf the rest; and few of
the causes listed are really fundamental. The mind instinctively begins
to reach back after the causes of all these causes. The social worker
who made the sweeping assertion that there are two great reasons for
marital