Psychoanalysis and self psychology: a metapsychological essay with a clinical illustration

This paper is an attempt to evaluate critically some theoretical and clinical consequences of the psychoanalytic psychology of the self in its broad, supraordinate position. From this either-or position, advocated by Kohut and his followers, self psychology corrodes some of the most central explanatory concepts of psychoanalysis--conflict, transference, and resistance. In an extensive case illustration, I have tried to show the conceptual and technical impoverishment of the self-psychological views with respect to the concepts of organization in conflict, in defense, and in development, and with respect to the role of aggression and to the concepts of transference and resistance. These consequences of the supraordinate self-psychological viewpoint are related to its overt attack on metapsychology, which is linked to an epistemological fallacy as a consequence of the exclusive use of empathy and introspection with grave consequences for our explanatory power, i.e., a fundamental confusion between the realms of content and of function. This also implies an obstacle in the systematic study of self-deception and a threat to psychoanalysis defined as the study of human behavior considered from the viewpoint of conflict. Finally, an attempt is made to integrate the views of Kohut with those of Winnicott and of classical metapsychology.     

Health psychology and clinical psychology: a comparison through content analysis.

Extension of a previous analysis of articles published in two journals representative of health psychology and two in health education showed some similarities and differences. The present analysis of 100 papers from two journals in health psychology and 495 from two in clinical psychology clearly shows health as a subspecialty of clinical psychology.     

The contribution of ego psychology to understanding the process of termination in psychoanalysis and psychotherapy

Ego psychology is presented as an integrated psychoanalytic developmental theory, including a theory of object relations. The process of termination is employed as one of the many possible illustrations of the usefulness of this theory. Termination is regarded as a process that pervades the treatment from the outset, rather than as the final phase of treatment only, because the treatment process, whether psychoanalysis or psychotherapy, includes continuous promotion of ever-increasing autonomy. Ideally, by the time termination proper takes place, maximum autonomy has been attained. To the definition of autonomy as intersystemic, involving relative independence of the ego from the drives (and from the super-ego), an object-relations dimension is added which extends that definition to include an intrasystemic consideration--namely, relative independence of the self-representation from the object representations. Especially in the treatment of the borderline conditions is the intrasystemic factor cogent because borderline states are characterized by varying degrees of incompletely differentiated self- and object representations. The objective, in the psychoanalysis of neurosis, where self- and object constancy already exist to a large degree, is ego autonomy in the intersystemic sense. In the psychotherapy of the borderline conditions, the objective is greater differentiation of the self-representation from the object representations.     

The function of theory in psychoanalysis: a self psychological perspective

Although aware of a lack of consensus in the literature about the exact nature of the relationship between psychoanalytic theory and the clinical process, the authors contend that the analyst's theory(ies) are inextricably intertwined with the treatment process. Two clinical case examples are presented to illustrate this and to highlight the authors' discussion of the empathic mode of listening and its role in self psychology, as well as the self-object transferences and the interpretive process in self psychology.     

Between the modern and the postmodern. The possibility of self and progressive understanding in psychology

Psychology assumes defensible notions of human subjectivity and understanding. Yet, some versions of postmodernism, including some of those currently influential within psychology, eschew the possibility of the kind of understanding-capable personhood on which modern psychology has depended. The authors argue for a skeptical, middle-ground position that might allow psychologists to resist a forced choice between modernism and postmodernism in their subject matter and understanding. The authors set up their argument with 2 stories of human development and change. These stories assume no fixed, essentialist foundations of the sort favored in classically modern psychologies, yet they maintain the possibility of both self and understanding within a real but contingent physical, biological, and sociocultural world. The authors then articulate a middle-ground position as one that avoids the fixed foundationalism, essentialism, and absolute certitude of modernity, without endorsing the radical arbitrariness, antisubjectivism, and anarchistic relativism of some versions of postmodernity.     

Diversity of learning psychoanalysis and analytical psychology

As the subject of this Conference is 'Diversity and its Limits: New Directions in Analytical Psychology and Psychoanalysis', I would like to investigate some aspects of education at our Institute--the East European Institute of Psychoanalysis--from the point of view of the meeting of West and East. I will look at the influence of this diversity on the formation and development of psychoanalysis and analytical psychology in Russia.     

Self psychology and its contributions to psychoanalysis

Abstract

A schematic overview of the theory and practice of self psychology is presented with a particular focus on what the author believes to be the most important contributions to psychoanalysis. It is recognized that self psychology, as with all psychoanalytic approaches, is an evolving and non-unitary theory. Fundamental features of self psychology are: 1. the consistent use of the empathic mode of observation, that is, to listen and understand from within the vantage point of the patient; 2. the primary motivation which involves strivings to develop and maintain a positive cohesive sense of self; 3. that each person has unique pre-wired “givens” included in the concept of the nuclear self; 4. that each person has selfobject needs which refer to the use of the object for the development and regulation of a positive sense of self; 5. that selfobject needs include mirroring (acknowledgement and affirmation), idealizing (protection, safety, and admired qualities), and twinship (a feeling of essential likeness, of sharing) needs; 6. that development and maintenance of a positive cohesive sense of self requires a sufficient responsiveness to selfobject needs; 7. that insufficient responsiveness arrests normal development, creates pathological organizing patterns of self, others, and self with others, and causes unresolvable conflict; and 8. that psychoanalytic treatment involves the analysis of the selfobject and repetitive dimensions of the transference in order to facilitate expansion of awareness, symbolic reorganization and self-righting.     

The cultural psychology of Kohut's self psychology

Contrary to criticism, Heinz Kohut's self psychology does not support an absorption into self nor a morally neutral response to society. Kohut's psychology of the self and narcissism aims toward an analysis of contemporary Western culture that will restore it. In the process of assisting individuals and culture to recover from the vicissitudes of narcissism, Kohut has introduced a new type of cultural psychology, a culture of empathy.     

The dynamic self in psychoanalytic psychology a formulation

Following Hartmann's theoretical formulations, the self has been explored primarily as a body of self‐representations coordinate to object representations; the dynamic organizations of the mind (the id‐egosuperego systems) have been seen as impersonal (nonself) functions.

This paper attempts a conception of the id‐ego‐superego structures as self‐functions in intimate relation to self‐representations. Building on an integration of Piagetian and psychoanalytic object relations frameworks (event theory), it proposes that the earliest self‐experience occurs in dynamic schemes of personally motivated interaction between self and nonself. These I‐schemes lay the groundwork for both the dynamic and the representational aspects of the self: Their structure results in experience characteristic of the dynamic id and in their character as undifferentiated interactions provides the base for the development of self‐ and object representations. Development occurs by integration and differentiation in processes of conflict resolution. The paper traces these developments in outline as they lead to the transition in the dynamic self from id to ego organizations, and in the self‐representations from part‐selves and part‐objects to a whole and individuated self in relation to whole objects.     

Communicative psychoanalysis: Contributions to clinical practice and the development of a science of psychoanalysis

Robert Langs' communicative approach to psychoanalysis has lead to new clinical insights and to a promising line of quantitative research. Fundamental concepts of the communicative approach are explained and illustrated with a clinical example. Characteristics of the approach, which distinguish it from other modern, interactive analytic theories are discussed; as well as a critical clinical insight derived from the communicative approach. The approach's unique contributions to the development of a science of psychoanalysis are explained. The advantages and problems of the communicative method are also discussed throughout the paper.     

Building Bridges: Teresa of Avila and self psychology

Utilizing concepts from self psychology, the author demonstrates the ways in which God functioned as a selfobject for Teresa of Avila. In addition, parallels are drawn between the spiritual journey as described by Teresa of Avila and the psychotherapeutic journey. Building bridges between the psychological and spiritual realms of experience can greatly increase our understanding of each, and enable us to help our clients become more integrated, whole persons.     

Followup in psychoanalysis: clinical and research values

Psychoanalysis has never developed a tradition of systematic followup study to evaluate outcome and to improve technique and theory for a variety of reasons, partly theoretical, stemming from the conception of the unfolding transference neurosis and its analytic resolution as the precondition for cure, and partly historical, having to do with the happenstance of its development as a private practice-based discipline and training outside of the academic setting. Freud, however, was never bound by such strictures and published whatever post-treatment data he acquired on all his best-known case histories. But following Freud most analysts, with some notable exceptions, eschewed followup activity as unanalytic. It is this tradition that more recent studies like those of Pfeffer in New York and the Psychotherapy Research Project of The Menninger Foundation in Topeka have squarely challenged. Data are presented from the Menninger project dealing specifically with the impact of routine planned followup on issues of treatment termination and resolution and on the nature of the post-treatment period. The degree and kind of patient cooperation with the followup inquiry, the impact of followup on treatment termination and resolution (both impeding and facilitating), and the role of followup intervention in relation to return to formal post-treatment therapy (or consolidating against it), are all discussed.