Relationship Between Deafness and Psychotic Illness

A hypothesis of the effect of deafness on the personality is propounded. A group of deaf psychotics is compared with non-deaf psychotics matched for sex and age. It is shown statistically that there is a signifIcantly higher proportion of paranoid schizophrenics among the deaf than among the non-deaf psychotics. The deaf psychotics were found to be less deteriorated than the non-deaf and an explanation suggested as being due to the fact that exogenous factors are associated with less genetic constitutional loading.