Psychology of sex - Total No. of Records in System :: 2032

PSYCHOLOGY OF SEXthe great majorityattributed to masturbation; even whennot excessive, an enormous variety of serious morbid conditionsfrom insanity downwards. A more temperate viewnow It is prevails. generallybelieved that masturbationmay, in special cases, lead on to various undesirable results,but it is no longer held that, even when practiced toexcess, it can, in healthy and sane individuals (supposingthat such are likely to practiceit to excess),produce thehighly morbid states once supposedto be a common consequence.It appears to have been largely due to Griesinger, inthat we owe the first au-the middle of the last century,thoritative appearance of a saner, more discriminatingview regarding the results of masturbation. Although stillin histo some extent fettered by the traditions prevalentday, Griesinger saw that it was not so much masturbationitself as the feelings aroused in sensitive minds by thesocial attitude towards masturbation which producedevileffects, and a hidden strife between shame, repentance,good intentions, and the irritation which impels to theact. He added that there are no specific signs of masturbation,and concluded that it is oftener a symptom than acause. The general progressof educated opinions sincethatdate has confirmed and carried forward the resultscautiously stated by Griesinger. This distinguished alienistthought that, when practicedin childhood, masturbationmight lead to insanity. Berkhan, in his investigation ofthe psychoses of childhood, found that in no single casexvas masturbation a cause. Vogel, Uffelmann, Emminghaus,and Moll, in the course of similar studies, all cameto almost similar conclusions. It isonly on a congenitallymorbid nervous system, Emminghaus insisted, that masturbationcan produce any serious results. Kiernan statesthat the supposed results of masturbation are due to either[126]