The lack of care and love and affectionate handling provided by a mother or mothering figure. Especially important during the first three years of life, the optimum period for the forming of social ATTACHMENTS. Maternal deprivation, in children who have been institutionalised or abandoned for example, frequently leads to physical, psychological or social problems in later life. See BOWLBY.

Technically used term in Britain and North America for describing people who score less than a 70 IQ.

In STATISTICS the most commonly used MEASURE OF CENTRAL TENDENCY. It is the arithmetic average, found by summing up the values of a group of numbers and dividing by the total.

BEHAVIOUR characterised by a MANIA.

In JUNG’S theories, a magic circle that represents the striving for total unity of the SELF. The idea conies from symbols of the cosmos found in different CULTURES.

Disorder of a single nerve that causes sharp, localised, intermittent pain.

In PSYCHOLOGY. the processes of growth and development which are common to all the members of a species and appear regardless of individual HEREDITY or environment. It is a concept that cuts right across the NATURE-NURTURE PROBLEM.

A PATHOLOGICAL extent of a melancholy mood. characterised by sadness and severe DEPRESSION.

See INVOLUTIONAL MELANCHOLIA.

Hating other people.

The concept of psychological disturbance as a medical problem, where patients are cured by doctors using drugs.

 See EXISTENTIAL PSYCHIATRY.