ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the forms of divergent thought and conduct which are defined as neurotic or psychotic and summarizes the more or less conventional definitions and descriptions of both the milder and the more severe forms of mental disorganization. It provides the student with a body of information upon which subsequent criticism may be projected. The former constitute milder forms of personality maladaptation, the latter those which are put into the general category of mental disease. The chapter discusses the interplay of culture and the forms of behavior and considers neurotic or psychotic, with people chief attention directed to non-Euro-American societies. It shows a social-psychological and cultural analysis of some of the problems, of mentally distressed and disorganized persons in our own society and culture. Moreover, the immediate backgrounds of this mental breakdown are usually emotional stress, overwork, alcoholism, sexual excesses, and other extreme behavior manifestations.
