Influence of deaf-mute parents on the character of their offspring.

Hearing children raised by deaf-mute parents suffer severe communication problems with their environment from the very moment of their birth. Later on feelings of alienation may ensue. Such conditions may influence the personality of offspring of deaf-mute people. A detailed representative case report of a patient with borderline personality is reported. The patient was a daughter of a quite typical deaf-mute couple. An attempt to relate some of her main characteristics and mechanisms of adaptation to factors in her early childhood is described.