157:. It was theorized to be caused by a split in the faculties of the mind. Prichard considered his first category of intellectual (rather than moral) insanity, to be equivalent to monomania. This in turn meant that the symptoms of moral insanity could increase, causing an overall degeneration into monomania. "On the surface, monomania can thus appear even more circumscribed a form of derangement than moral insanity." However, Esquirol by contrast considered moral insanity to be simply one form of monomania.
313:
diagnosis was meant to imply a congenital disorder, and to be made without moral judgement, though Koch has been described as deeply rooted in a
Christian faith. Toward the mid 20th century the terminology of the 'psychopathic' would become specifically associated with an aggressive and anti-social personality. A more general concept of character disorders came into use by
202:
capitalism. Prichard saw it as an issue within human consciousness, identity and judgement; he was also influenced by theories that natural human emotions could become unbalanced in conditions of civilisation far removed from nature. However, he also linked moral insanity to a debasement of the more refined emotions, which he in turn saw as more associated with the
123:'s widely accepted axiom that insanity always stemmed from faulty intellectual connections or mistaken perceptions. However, Pinel's concept focused on a frenzy of the passions, particularly involving rage and violence. For Prichard the typical syndrome was more a form of extreme eccentricity, and he would later refer to Pinel's type as a madness of the instincts.
301:. As stated by the historian F.A. Whitlock: "there not the remotest resemblance between their examples and what today would be classed as psychopathic personality." Prichard's "moral insanity" was a catch-all term of behavioural disorders whose only feature in common was an absence of delusions: it is not cognate with the modern diagnostic category of
45:. He defined moral insanity as: "madness consisting in a morbid perversion of the natural feelings, affections, inclinations, temper, habits, moral dispositions, and natural impulses, without any remarkable disorder or defect of the interest or knowing and reasoning faculties, and particularly without any insane illusion or hallucinations."
104:
three types involved increasing degrees of intellectual abnormality: a partial derangement that was limited to certain trains of thought; a full mania, by which was meant 'raving madness' regardless of topic; and lastly, a breakdown of any connections between ideas, referred to as incoherence or dementia.
261:
of individuals alleged to be insane, Prichard was cautious in using the diagnosis of moral insanity, partly because the educated classes that were typical clients tended to hold the asylum system in very low regard. Prichard tended to suggest it came down to an assessment of individual mental state
201:
Prichard appeared to view the disorder in terms of both affect and morality. As a religious and conservative man, he shared in some gloom about a perceived decline in morals and religion, and increase of selfishness. Some attributed this to socioeconomic developments related to industrialization or
197:
referred to a set of psychosocial techniques rather than necessarily defined as ethical practice. Under Pinel's guidance, patients were freed from chains and shackles. Prichard used a mixture of moral treatment techniques as well as traditional medical treatments of bleeding, purging, vomiting etc.
103:
Overall, Prichard defined insanity as a, "chronic disease, manifested by deviations from the healthy and natural state of the mind." He then proposed four broad categories. Moral insanity was for disorders that only seemed to arise from a person's feelings and habits, not his intellect. The other
312:
sought to make the moral insanity concept more scientific and suggested in 1891 the phrase 'psychopathic inferiority' (later personality) be used instead. This referred to continual and rigid patterns of misconduct or dysfunction in the absence of apparent intellectual disability or illness. The
211:, which attempted to localise aspects of the mind and personality to particular areas of the brain, as assessed by the size of bumps in the skull. The alternative was to locate mental disorder in temperament, abstractly located in the visceral organs or nervous system in a then modern form of
262:
and ability. He emphasized property and social order as the rationale for confinement: "Of all these arrangements the maintenance of public order is the principal object, and the second is the preservation of the property belonging to the lunatic and the interest of his family."
186:(mania without delusion) had no relation to the moral faculty. Moral insanity was a form of mental derangement in which the intellectual faculties were unaffected, but the affects or emotions were damaged, causing patients to be carried away by some kind of furious instinct (
142:, concluding that a number of disorders in different divisions of that scheme would be more simply gathered under the heading 'moral insanity'. He suggested the category could also be termed 'parapathia', or alternatively 'pathomania' by analogy with
274:
in 1843 which are still referenced today. Nevertheless, modern conceptions of responsibility have been forged in part through the medical and legal exchanges over moral insanity, including anticipations of the diagnosis in the writings of
119:, had distinguished between medical conditions with hallucinations and those involving depraved appetites or feelings. But he credits Pinel as the first in psychiatry to clearly distinguish madness without delerium, in opposition to
99:
in referring to what they saw as a result of madness – a disruption or perversion of the emotions or moral sense. This usage had little to do with
Prichard's diagnostic definition of the term as a form of madness itself, however.
237:
were depicted in
Victorian novels and movies of the time. They were similar in that they were both abnormalities of an otherwise normal mind, though the former was a systemic malfunction and the latter an isolated aberration.
249:
in which delusional symptoms were required. In legal trials this definition had proved to be a great source of embarrassment to alienists because unless delusional symptoms could be clearly shown judges would not consider a
165:
Contemporary misunderstanding of the term derives from the double meaning of the word "moral" in the nineteenth century context. According to
Erdmann Mueller in a comprehensive 1899 treatise on moral insanity: "the word
80:) referred to insanity without delusion. That is, the person was thought to be mad in one area only and thus the personality of the individual might be distorted but his or her intellectual faculties were unimpaired.
206:
classes, such that a person still knew right from wrong but became unable to conduct themselves "with decency and propriety in the business of life". Prichard was also concerned to challenge the development of
305:. However, Whitlock has suggested that the diagnosis gradually changed into moral imbecility over the turn of the century and that in turn transformed into something like the current concept of psychopathy.
241:
The context leading to the conceptualization of this diagnostic category was undoubtedly borne out of the frustration of alienists (the term is approximately equivalent to the modern day one of
83:
The term 'moral', at that time and taken originally from French, could mean the affective, or interior depth of an individual rather than necessarily a reference to their ethics.
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Ultimately, the concept of moral insanity did not change the orthodox legal defense of insanity which required the clear presence of delusion, as embodied in the
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asserted that while it may appear to stem from the emotions, it was often due to a weakening of the 'higher centres' of will, and he thus suggested a new name '
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290:, and toward the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century converged with ideas of moral imbecility and deficiency, as well as with an anti-vice
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134:, which attempted to locate them below specific parts of the skull. He was also influenced by a school of thought associated with the physician
138:, which posited disorders of emotions or temperament rather than intellect. Prichard also considered a complex categorical scheme developed by
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Several writers have sounded caution over the notion that the diagnostic category of moral insanity was a direct forerunner of
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consisting of abnormal emotions and behaviours in the apparent absence of intellectual impairments,
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34:. It was an accepted diagnosis in Europe and America through the second half of the 19th century.
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519:"J C Prichard's concept of moral insanity—a medical theory of the corruption of human nature"
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discussed moral insanity as a sign of poor moral willpower or moral sense.
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The concept of moral insanity was indebted to the work of physician
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in the concept moral insanity is derived from the word
871:"A Note on Moral Insanity and Psychopathic Disorders"
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The latter term had been introduced by the physician
91:The term 'moral insanity' had been used earlier by
448:A Dictionary of Psychological Medicine. Volume 2.
759:Patrick Brantlinger, William B. Thesing (2002).
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732:Vincent Mark Durand, David H. Barlow (2005).
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795:. Cambridge University Press. p. 426.
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245:) by the definition of madness provided by
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591:. Cambridge University Press. p. 51.
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16:Obsolete term for type of mental disorder
968:Finney, Charles G. (10 September 1856).
614:"James Cowles Prichard, M.D., 1786–1848"
574:. E.L. Carey & A. Hart. p. 37.
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178:'s terminology, and the translation of
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107:Prichard considered that some early
1020:Obsolete terms for mental disorders
762:A companion to the Victorian novel
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735:Essentials Of Abnormal Psychology
869:Whitlock, F. A. (1 April 1982).
446:Tuke, Daniel Hack (ed.) (1892).
360:, Carey & Hart, Philadelphia
765:. Wiley-Blackwell. p. 76.
303:antisocial personality disorder
904:American Journal of Psychiatry
711:. Athlone Press. p. 635.
566:James Cowles Prichard (1837).
450:J. & A. Churchill. p. 813.
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354:James Cowles Prichard (1837)
826:Law and History Review, 2008
855:Berrios, German E. (1996).
845:10.1177/0952695102015001073
585:Sally Shuttleworth (1996).
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916:10.1176/appi.ajp.164.1.35
680:. Springer. pp. 193
535:10.1017/S0025727300061329
517:Augstein HF (July 1996).
93:Thomas Arnold (physician)
835:Rimke, H. & Hunt, A
672:Verplaetse, Jan (2009).
435:Sass & Herpertz 1995
370:John Macpherson (1899).
233:Both moral insanity and
70:folie lucide raisonnante
56:, insanity. His concept
612:Leigh D (August 1955).
1015:Obsolete medical terms
977:The Oberlin Evangelist
789:Berrios, G.E. (1996).
395:. Classic text no.37.
292:moral hygiene movement
259:involuntary commitment
22:referred to a type of
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568:"Case 2 & Case 3"
376:. Macmillan. p.
319:personality disorders
299:psychopathic disorder
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875:Psychiatric Bulletin
859:. Cambridge: p. 427.
468:. Fontana. pp.
460:Porter, Roy (1999).
281:Common Sense Realism
155:Étienne-Jean Georget
78:Moralisches Irresein
193:Likewise, the term
74:monomanie affective
943:. Guilford Press.
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492:Jones D. W (2016)
128:faculty psychology
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