The organization of mental and physical traits during adolescence

Abstract

The data for the study were derived from the physical and mental measurements of 1,118 individuals of various adolescent ages from 5 different groups. Pearson coefficients of correlation between mental and physical traits were computed for the 5 groups and found to be positive but low; the partial correlations were also positive and low. The author points out that the data presented do not support the view that there is a general maturity factor for which some one trait is the symptom. Part of the literature which reports a high positive correlation between mental and physical traits is critically examined and found to contain inadequacies in procedure and inappropriate data. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)