Originally published in 1976, this volume reports research that will help us to understand the causes of psychogenic diseases. It deals both experimentally and theoretically with the question of symptom specificity in psychosomatic research – why some individuals respond to psychological stress with gastric disorders, others with sexual impotence, and still others with high blood pressure. As the author notes in summarizing his conclusions, "The repeated pairing of activation of a given organic system with intense nervous stress directs the pathological influence of the stressor...