The catathymic crisis, first recognized by Wertham as an important psychiatric syndrome met with violent delinquency, is defined in its clinical course. The dynamics and genesis are scrutinized, illustrated by three short cases.
One case of sexual killing in a catathymic crisis is reviewed in details.
The connections and differences in clinical course, symptomatology and genesis between the catathymic crisis and the psychogenic psychosis, are discuseed. Those people who have gone through a catathymic crisis have more pre-genital disturbances in the aggression-management and the psycho-sexual development than those who have gone through a psychogenic psychosis. More open violence occured in the paren tal environment of the first category of patients.