The syndrome of abuse dwarfism (psychosocial dwarfism or reversible hyposomatotropism).

Abstract

In abuse dwarfism the behavioral signs include some or all of the following: (1) a history of unusual eating and drinking behavior, reversible on change of domicile, such as eating from a garbage can and drinking from a toilet bowl, stealing food, alleged picky eating and rejecting food at the table, polydipsia and polyphagia, possibly alternating with vomiting and possibly also with self-starvation; (2) a history of such behavioral symptoms as enuresis, encopresis, social apathy or inertia, defiant aggressiveness, sudden tantrums, crying spasms, insomnia, eccentric sleeping and waking schedule, pain agnosia, and self-injury, all occurring only in the growth-retarding environment; (3) retarded motor development, with improvement on removal of the child from the domiclle of abuse; (4) retarded intellectual growht, reversible on change of domicile by as much as 30 to 50 IQ points; and (5) a history of pathologic family relationships, including unusual cruelty and neglect, either somatic or psychic or both.

• Authors: J Money
• Journal: American journal of diseases of children (1960) (Am J Dis Child) Vol. 131 Issue 5 Pg. 508-13 (May 1977) ISSN: 0002-922X [Print] United States
• PMID: 857651 (Publication Type: Case Reports, Journal Article, Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.)

Topics

• Adolescent
• Adult
• Child Abuse
• Dwarfism (etiology)
• Eating
• Educational Measurement
• Growth
• Humans
• Infant
• Intelligence
• Male
• Motor Activity
• Pain
• Parent-Child Relations
• Psychosexual Development
• Psychosocial Deprivation
• Sleep
• Speech