Not “Filed Away as Finally Dealt With”

This essay considers some historical, clinical, and personal dimensions of Sandor Ferenczi's contributions to psychoanalysis. It uses a clinical framework to develop a new perspective of the Freud–Ferenczi relation (and of its impact on the development of psychoanalysis), which despite smoldering conflict, persisted for twenty-five years and was Freud's longest-lasting intimate friendship. A case is made for the open, undefensive, experience-drenched basis of Ferenczi's work to assure its continuing usefulness to the psychoanalyst of today, which, as is demonstrated, can lead in surprising directions.     

A dialogue of unconsciouses. A contribution to the panel 'Jung and Ferenczi--the emergent conversation'

I want to explore the notion of 'mutual introjection, the developmental essence of an autobiographical dialogue', an idea that has recently crystallized in the continuing collaborative work of Gershon J. Molad of Israel and myself concerning the autobiographical contribution to the dialogue between analysis (Molad & Vida 2002). One of the sources of this crystallization is the experience of my consultative relationship with a Jungian colleague, who, after reading some of this collaborative work, paraphrased Jung's implication that if, in the course of treatment, the doctor is not as transformed as the patient, nothing has happened (1946). In this paper, I want to breathe some life into these theoretical-sounding words: 'mutual introjection, the developmental essence of an autobiographical dialogue'.     

Abandonment, Religion, and Male Melancholia: A Psychoanalytic Study of Archpriest Avvakum's Religious Autobiography

The present study is a psychoanalytic reading of Archpriest Avvakum's autobiography and takes its cue from some observations made by Russian and Ukrainian historian Edward Keenan, who offered a tentative diagnosis of manic-depression to describe Avvakum's personality. In my view, Donald Capps's analysis of religious male melancholia supports Keenan's observations, and I argue that Avvakum carried his childhood experiences and conflicts over into his later religious life. His religious life manifested a series of transferences and displacements, with Mary the Mother of God, God the Father, and the Church functioning as his loving or positive relationships with his family; and Patriarch Nikon and his followers embodying everything he feared and resented about his own childhood—change and abandonment.     

Exploring dynamics of abusive lesbian relationships: preliminary analysis of a multisite,qualitative study

This paper presents preliminary results from a multisite, qualitative study on violence in lesbian relationships. A framework for conducting community-based, empowerment research that draws on theories of community psychology, feminism, and postmodernism is presented. The study was designed to understand the dynamics of abusive lesbian relationships and social service providers' responses to the abuse. Results from 80 in-depth interviews with lesbians who have experienced relationship violence are examined with a particular focus on a pattern of first relationships being abusive and a theme of shifting power dynamics. Analysis of focus group discussions with 45 feminist service providers (e.g., counselors, shelter workers, social workers, healthcare providers) reveals the difficulties in assessing the power dynamics of abusive same-sex relationships and in developing appropriate responses when relying on heterosexually gendered models developed to address men's violence against women. The preliminary results present implications both for how we theorize and research this form of violence, and for improving the practices and policies of social services that work with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered communities.     

Influence of Social Perception and Social Monitoring on Structural Priming

Although structural priming has been considered to be an independent cognitive process, recent evidence suggests that structural priming is modulated by sociocognitive factors such as social perception; speakers are more likely to mimic the sentence structure of a socially desirable interlocutor than the structure of a less desirable interlocutor. This study aims to further address the role of sociocognitive factors in language use by investigating how individual differences in social perception and tendency to align with others (i.e., social monitoring) modulate same‐verb structural priming. In particular, we investigate how likely students are to repeat a sentence structure of a teacher depending on their perception of the teacher and their social monitoring tendency. Our results demonstrate that students’ tendency to imitate a sentence structure of the teacher is positively influenced by their perception of the teacher but negatively by social monitoring. We suggest that the effects may be accounted for in terms of their influence on attention and memory encoding.     

孔子是怎样解释《周易》的

孔子与《易》是有密切关系的,抛开《史记》和帛书的记载不言,仅就《论语》中两条最直接的材料来看确实如此。"加我数年……"当为孔子五十之前所说。五十之前,孔子也曾学《易》,而孔子认为知天命之年尤需学《易》。"不占而已"表明孔子解《易》以德,判定吉凶不需要占筮,而是取决于人的德性。孔子以"生生之德性"解《易》,以"道德必然性"解"天命",通过揭去《周易》的神秘外衣,发掘并发展其天人之学,将隐微难言的性与天道托诸于显著的人道德性,发展出天人合一的德性学说。     

Chinese college students' general and relationship‐specific representations of adult attachment: Variable‐centred and person‐centred analysis

Formerly, researchers often treated adult attachment as a trait‐like construct with consistency across relationship contexts. However, recent studies have shown that people possess multiple relationship‐specific attachment representations, and inter‐correlations among them are only in a small‐to‐medium range. The aim of this study is to test whether these variable‐centred results could be replicated in China and further supplement them with a person‐centred analysis focusing on identifying prototypical patterns of multiple working models across relationships. We administrated measurements of general and four relationship‐specific (mother/father/best friend/romantic partner) working models and indicators of psychological adjustment upon 302 Chinese college students. Results from variable‐centred analysis demonstrated the cross‐relationship variability in working models. Furthermore, global indicators of psychological adjustment were better predicted by general models, while relationship‐specific indicators were better predicted by corresponding relationship‐specific models. These results largely replicate previous Western studies, supporting the existence of multiple attachment representations in China. In person‐centred analysis, a latent profile analysis identified four typical classes of working model profiles: all‐average, all‐secure, romantic‐insecure and peer‐secure. These classes differed not only in the cross‐relationship variability of their working models, but also in their levels of psychological adjustment. These interesting patterns may have theoretical implications and are worthy of further examination.     

The nature and consequences of topic avoidance in Chinese and Taiwanese close relationships

Two studies examined topic avoidance in Chinese and Taiwanese opposite‐sex friendships and romantic relationships. Five areas of topic avoidance emerged through analytic induction and cluster analysis: negative appraisal, relational issues, sexual issues, politics, and personal experience. Partner protection, negative relational impact, and self inefficacy emerged as the most common reasons for avoidance. Results revealed that friends, relative to romantic partners, engaged in higher levels of topic avoidance. Taiwanese participants, moreover, avoided discussing politics to a greater extent than did mainland Chinese participants. Lacking closeness was the main reason behind avoidance of political discussion. Topic avoidance was also linked to relationship quality, as relational satisfaction negatively predicted relational issue avoidance and topic avoidance breadth (i.e. the number of topics regularly avoided in the relationship). The authors explain these and other findings based on Chinese cultural codes and historically‐embedded concepts that shape interpersonal interaction.     

The role and importance of interpretation in the talking cure

Starting with an exploration of how the concept of interpretation in analytical treatment has evolved, the author goes on to discuss the role and importance of interpretation in the changes that psychoanalysis brings about. Although interpretation is looked upon as the key element in psychoanalytic activity, the fact that it is subsumed within the transference raises questions as to its influence in the analytical domain. After discussing the foundations of interpretation with respect to the theory of psychoanalytic treatment and examining Strachey’s views on this, the author defines the conditions and constraints surrounding interpretation and preparatory interventions in order to outline the essential nature of the interpretative process as seen against the wider background of the analyst’s activity as manifested through speech. This leads to a discussion of the relative influence of insight and suggestion in bringing about therapeutic change. The author draws the conclusion that interpretation works as a metaphor in lifting repression.     

Some reflections on the unique time of Nachträglichkeit in theory and clinical practice

Of the various forms that the matter of time assumes in analysis, Nachträglichkeit represents Freud’s first intuition on the subject. The focus of this article is directed toward the specific temporal dimension that the concept of Nachträglichkeit expresses, and how that dimension, which overturns linear time, is expressed in clinical work. The concept of Nachträglichkeit is approached from a theoretical point of view, tracing back the role and development that this notion has had in psychoanalytic Freudian and post‐Freudian thinking. The goal of this article is to demonstrate how Nachträglichkeit represents the unique temporal movement of the analytic session and the characteristic positioning of the mind of the analyst at work. Three clinical examples are presented. The analytic scene is formulated as occurring in two times, and through the working through that takes place, patients can recover the enigmatic ‘remainder’, which is consequently traumatic and which has compulsively accompanied them through the various times of their existence. Nachträglichkeit, as a non‐linear temporality, introduces a unique dimension into the clinical work that influences listening to and interpretation of the material. The recognition of that (trauma, infantile sexuality, non‐linear temporality) has consequences for the analyst’s way of working in session and on the interpretation of clinical material, as I will try to show through my theoretical exposition and clinical examples.