powerlessness and the propensity for violent acting-out
something about the more basically Powerless an individual feels, the more the likelihood for the propensity for violent acting-out—and Lenz found the observation to be sound.
Context
A line from a Recovery-Issue paperback lying around the room states the scene's whole thesis in clinical register — the more powerless a person feels, the likelier the violent acting-out — and Lenz, reading it lying on Day's mattress, finds it sound without once applying it to himself. The Program's own literature diagnoses him in the third person; the recognition that would be a first step passes through him as agreement about somebody else.