The Kallikak Family: A Study in the Heredity of Feeble-Mindedness was a 1912 book by the American psychologist and eugenicist Henry H. Goddard. The work was an extended case study of Goddard's for the inheritance of "feeble-mindedness," a general category referring to a variety of mental disabilities including mental retardation, learning disabilities, and mental illness. Goddard concluded that an entire variety of mental traits were hereditary in nature and that it was important for society to institute a check upon the reproduction of "unfit" individuals. Goddard's research and argument The book begins by discussing the case of "Deborah Kallikak" (the name Kallikak is a pseudonym derived from the Greek ????? (kalos) and ????? (kakos), meaning "good" and "bad," respectively), a woman in Goddard's institution, the New Jersey Home for the Education and Care of Feebleminded Children (now Vineland Training Scho

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