The deaf and dumb : their education and social position / by W.R. Scott.
- Scott, W. R. (William Robson), 1811-1877.
- Date:
- 1870
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The deaf and dumb : their education and social position / by W.R. Scott. Source: Wellcome Collection.
47/284 (page 31)
![have the organs of hearing diseased. Eleven cases have been admitted into the West of England Institution, where uncles, aunts, or cousins have been deaf and dumb, and one case where the children were alternately born deaf and dumb. We have heard mothers of deaf and dumb children frequently attribute the infirmity of their child to strong and disagreeable mental impressions received by them during pregnancy, and we know there are many kinds of disease such as hare-]ip, club-foot, idiocy, &c., which have been said to be produced by fright or strong and sudden mental emotion in the mother. Whether an interruption of the fsetal development takes place in such cases or not, it would be very difficult to ascertain with certainty ; but that strong impressions have an influence on the child at this period, a variety of observations would lead us to believe. Out of 300 cases admitted into the West of England Institution, no less than twenty mothers have attributed their child's disease to fright during pregnancy. During such time, therefore, mothers ought to avoid everything likely to startle or give them unpleasant trains of thought, and such injurious impressions are more especially to be guarded against in the earlier stages of pregnancy, as the fright is usually said to have happened about the third or fourth month—a time when least](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b20412484_0049.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
