The cognitive schemas of 208 subjects were elicited in relation to 12 hypothetical symptoms which are most commonly presented by patients suffering from psychiatric disorder. Three types of explaining schemas were recognised as physical, psychosocial and supernatural explanations. Somatic symptoms tended to have physical explanations and emotional symptoms tended to have psychosocial explanations although both are known in clinical practice to indicate psychiatric disorder and to disappear together when the disorder recovers. Supernatural explanations were most likely in elderly males and in extended families. Symptoms associated with supernatural cognitive schemas fit in with the cultural background and not with the level of modern education achieved.

Secondary school pupils and their parents were investigated using the scaled version of the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28) and by a questionnaire designed to study attitudes involved in inter-generational conflict in psychiatric patients. Parent-pupil and inter-parental conflict in answers to the attitude questionnaires were taken as measures of intergenerational and intra-generational conflicts respectively. The former significantly exceeded the latter. Parent-student conflict was higher when the students involved were females, Kuwaiti, or had less educated fathers. The tendency of the number of reported GHQ symptoms to be higher in members of families with higher inter-generational conflict did not reach statistical significance. There is an apparent discrepancy between this finding and the prominence of inter-generational conflict in clinical material.

Two hundred and eight individuals were interviewed in order to study the behaviour they adopt in relation to the most common somatic and emotional symptoms of mental ill-health. Illness behaviour included ignoring, brooding, self-help and consultation of others. Older individuals tended more frequently to resort to meditation, native healers and doctors. Males consulted doctors more than females. Brooding was more frequent in well educated subjects. A group of married expatriates who left their wives in their original countries were the most likely to consult doctors. Education and marital status were the most predictive of brooding and self-help behaviour. Self-help was the most commonly adopted illness behaviour. The results are explained in terms of the social and cultural background of the individuals studied because this influences their methods of expressing distress and their action in relation to symptoms.

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