Reflections on the setting in the treatment of adolescents1

The author focuses on the signifi cance of the setting for the development of the psychoanalytic process, especially in the case of adolescents who request analytic treatment. Her main goals are to specify: a) how the setting is confi gured with this type of patients; and b) to what extent it contributes to the creation of an inner space that may internalize a fi gure with reverie‐a good object that will metabolize the bad and thus enable identifi cation. The setting, which is considered the necessary context for analytic work, is defi ned as bearing two facets: that of the analyst, which must be constant and stable, and that of the adolescent, which will progressively change provided that the analyst maintains a fi rm context that contributes to make the adolescent feel contained and accepted. It is such a feeling that will enable the unfolding of the analytic process. The author emphasizes the importance of the presence of the analyst (his or her voice, the manner of his or her speech, and so on), and the need for the analyst to comply with the rules he or she has established together with the patient. She presents a clinical case to illustrate this conceptualization.     

NON-DISCURSIVE EXPRESSIVE ELEMENTS AND THEIR ROLE IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF MEANING IN THE ANALYTICAL SITUATION

The author discusses the role of non‐discursive expressive elements in the construction of the analytical situation, using three examples to illustrate the problems with which he is concerned. His claim is that the issue in question necessarily involves the subject of affects, and he proceeds to discuss the difficulties associated with this subject. In addition, he considers the contributions of Green and Imbasciati, and Kleinian developments of this theme, including also the contributions of Bion—in particular the latter's theories concerning thought, in which emotion comes to assume an essential place in the origin of thinking. The author resumes the discussion by taking up his clinical examples, using them to put forward the view that non‐discursive expressive elements may well play a decisive role in the construction of meaning in the analytical situation. He suggests also that the meaning of an emotional experience may be thought of as a construction contributed to by a number of symbolic forms which both interfere with and interact with the symbolic system of language. Following examination of his third example, the author reflects on ‘musicality’, a notion sometimes referred to informally in clinical data in connection with the ‘emotional climate’ of the session. He proposes that the complex problem of meaning in music be extended to cover the construction of meaning in the psychoanalytic setting, and in so doing returns to ideas put forward by Suzanne Langer. His underlying view here is that essential elements of the musical phenomenon and essential elements of particular forms of emotional life give rise to the same emotional matrices—perhaps to what Meltzer calls ‘musical deep grammar’. Finally, the author considers various symbolic forms that contribute to the particular configuration of analytical situations, suggesting that the mental condition of ‘free‐floating attention’ requires the broad availability to the analyst's mind of a multiplicity of symbolic forms, his conversion of these into new expressions of meaning, and the possibility of their verbal communication by him to the patient.     

DEVELOPMENT OF MULTIPLE JOB PERFORMANCE MEASURES IN A REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLE OF JOBS

The goal of criterion development in Project A was to construct multiple measures of the major components of job performance such that the total performance domain for a representative sample of the population of entry-level enlisted positions in the U.S. Army was covered. These measures were to be used as criteria against which to validate both experimental and existing predictors of job performance. The initial model specified that performance is multidimensional within two major categories of dimensions designated as organization-wide and job specific. The development strategy involved describing the total domain of job content via extensive task analyses and critical incident analyses, generating the critical performance dimensions that constitute it, constructing measures for each dimension, and evaluating each measure using expert judgment and field test data. The specific measures developed consisted of rating scales, tests of job knowledge, hands-on job samples, and archival records. The major steps in the job analyses, content sampling, instrument construction, and instrument evaluation are described, and the final array of criterion measures is presented.