Identification: psychoanalytic and biological perspectives

In recent attempts to bring psychoanalysis into greater contact with other sciences, a number of works have explicated neural science concepts and phenomena--affect, memory, consciousness--for the psychoanalyst. These efforts have helped analysts build a more scientific foundation for their theory and practice. A related task remains--namely, to take psychoanalytic concepts and see how they relate to other sciences. The concept of identification has a long history in psychoanalytic theory. It is seen in parent-child interactions, in teaching and mentoring relationships, and in psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. Neuropsychology and evolutionary biology have explored the phylogenetic precursors of identification, while genetics and infant observation provide insights into individual processes of identification. Finally, neuroscience, particularly recent studies of mirror neurons, offers information about the biological mechanisms of imitation and the relationship of imitation to identification. Findings from these sciences are presented in an effort to further the psychoanalytic understanding of identification, especially its biological underpinnings.     

Primo Levi's loneliness: psychoanalytic perspectives on suicide-nearness

To elucidate suicide-nearness, the perspectives of the death drive and narcissism are applied to the writings of Primo Levi. Emerging themes are Levi's struggle to maintain his self-regard from his year as a prisoner in Auschwitz and onward, and his observations on xenophobia, violence, and the need for love. The gradual increase of depressive content in Levi's work is noted, as are his identifications with others who succumbed in the Holocaust or took their lives after surviving it. The conflict between the wish for peace and the need for love is seen as impossible to resolve under the threat of extermination and as reemerging in the prevailing sense of loneliness that Levi described.     

Current perspectives on psychoanalytic Rorschach assessment

In this article, I present as clear and as updated an account as possible of several of the essential features that comprise a psychoanalytic approach to the Rorschach. Specific attention is accorded the assessment frame, the language of assessment, sources of assessment information, and differing approaches to the interpretation of Rorschach data. The article comes out of a Rorschach tradition begun by Rapaport, extended by Schafer and Mayman, and presently being updated by Leichtman and Smith.     

Four psychoanalytic perspectives: a study of differences in interpretive interventions

This research study was designed to test two main hypotheses: (1) there are detectable differences in interpretive style among classical, Kleinian, Kohutian, and Kernbergian analysts; and (2) the nature of these differences can be discerned and described. The methodology consists of three phases of data collection. The statistical findings are presented, along with clinical examples, followed by a discussion of their implications.     

The dynamics of owning and disowning: psychoanalytic and family perspectives.

The dynamics of owning and disowning one's inner life have both intrapsychic and transactional or interpersonal dimensions. Freud opened new vistas on our inner world using psycoanalysis as a tool. Although not unaware of the effects of family members upon each other, Freud's rejection of the seduction theory of neurosis in 1897 fatefully influenced the future course of psychoanalysis, placing the primary focus on intrapsychic relations. Until today, it has remained the task-perhaps the principal one--of psychoanalytic theorists to do justice to the interpersonal and family realm that Freud neglected, without sacrificing the enormous insights we owe to Freud. Three conditions for successful inner ownership are described: a capacity for self-object differentiation; tolerance of ambivalence; and a sense of physical integrity, of having a cohesive, nuclear ego. The pathology of inner ownership is related to a pathology of interpersonal ownership as transacted on the family level. One form of such relational pathology--parental overowning, as revealed primarily in families with schizophrenic members--is discussed, with a case example.     

Bulimia

No abstract available for this article.