From the publisher
This work opens a book series under the general title “MODERN PSYCHOANALYSIS”, which aims to introduce the reader to the main directions of psychoanalytic thought - its theoretical positions, applied developments and clinical practice. The need for an undertaking of this kind is dictated, first of all, by the urgent need of the thinking part of Russian society for a serious rethinking of the world psychoanalytic experience of recent decades and its inclusion in the general context of the domestic scientific and educational systems.
For various reasons, including ideological ones, the rich creative heritage of Freud’s closest students and followers, as well as the latest research by current psychoanalysts—many of the master’s own works, fortunately, at one time were published in Russian, although subsequently hidden in all sorts of “special storage” - they found themselves excluded from the scientific, clinical and cultural processes in Russia. This circumstance prompted our publishing house, along with the already published “Library of Analytical Psychology” series, to begin publishing books directly in the psychoanalytic series.
The practical task of “restorative” work of this kind, along with the publication of books of psychocentric and medical-centric directions in classical and postclassical psychoanalysis, is also the publication of a number of works that make it possible to clarify the psychopathological specificity of the totalitarian history of society as a medical history, within the framework of which a new fictional genre emerges. Historians, political scientists, and publicists have already made their feasible contribution to the creation of a kind of “circular frame” of the social history of Russia, but psychologists have yet to articulate the discursive articulation of our latest psychohistory, which would make it possible to reveal to society the difference between the history of the individual and social soul and the history of its illness. The mental, alas, is too often seen through pathology...
This project is the fruit of the efforts of many people, not only employees of the publishing house “B. S.K.” and the Information Center for Psychoanalytic Culture, which initiated the very idea of the publishing series, but also a number of other organizations.
In carrying out such a serious undertaking, we are constantly assisted by the International Psychoanalytic Association (IPA), the European Psychoanalytic Federation (EPF), a number of foreign publishing houses and foundations, in particular the German charitable foundation Inter Nations, the Russian Psychoanalytic Society and the Russian Psychoanalytic Association in Moscow, the Society for the Promotion of Modern art "A-Z" in St. Petersburg. We express our deep gratitude to all of them.
We are well aware of the difficult task we have undertaken. Therefore, we are grateful in advance to all our future readers for their critical advice and wishes.
January 1997
Preface to the Russian edition
Improving the political climate in the world helps restore broken international ties, eliminates prejudices in relations between states and social systems, and has a beneficial effect on the development of scientific knowledge, which should rightfully be attributed to psychoanalysis.
At one time, Russian psychoanalysis turned out to be one of the many victims of Bolshevism, and later German psychoanalysis became objectionable to the National Socialist regime. The dictatorial regimes that established themselves in Argentina and Chile had an equally depressing influence on the development of psychoanalysis in these countries.
Being not only a medical practice, but also a cultural theory, psychoanalysis is able to help better understand the historical dynamics of such political processes. This help may also consist in revealing aspects of shame and grief that previously had to be defended against, as well as in discovering latent prejudices and one’s own traits in the image of the enemy, which promises the possibility of positive social changes towards a multicultural society. For Germany, solving problems of this kind became especially urgent after the unification of the two German states in 1989.
The great world with its previously seemingly vast and endless expanses is now accessible not only to the imagination, but also, thanks to modern media, is completely visible.
Previously, individual nations independently chose one or another path of development; now they are in constant, multilateral interaction. Modern developments in systems theory convincingly indicate that not a single action in any country goes unnoticed for other countries and has certain consequences for them. We are talking not so much about causal processes with their inherent cause-and-effect relationships, but about circular processes, the slightest change in which affects the political system as a whole.
In such a socio-political context, the scientific community is also oriented not nationally, but multiculturally or internationally. At one time, psychoanalysis, which arose in Vienna, quickly crossed the borders of Austria and became the property of world culture...
The international spread and development of psychoanalysis led, however, not only to the destruction of barriers of misunderstanding, but to numerous splits, which began with differences in views between the three “pillars” of the psychoanalytic movement - Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav Jung. Subsequently, contradictions haunted psychoanalysts in other countries, pulling in different directions not only socially oriented political critics, but also completely non-politicized clinical structures and psychotherapeutic institutions.
Russia was no exception on this path of disengagement. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the unified Psychoanalytic Association also split into a number of regional associations. In May 1995, the Russian Psychoanalytic Association separated from the Russian (“Arbat”) Psychoanalytic Society (Moscow). There are two independent psychoanalytic structures in St. Petersburg: the East European Institute of Psychoanalysis and the St. Petersburg Psychoanalytic Society with the publishing Information Center for Psychoanalytic Culture. In Rostov-on-Don there is a “Rostov Psychoanalytic Association” and even in the distant Siberian city of Tomsk they are interested in modern psychoanalysis.
In this regard, there is every reason to believe that the book “Modern Psychoanalysis,” written in Germany in 1989 for the general public, will arouse interest in Russia.
As for the enthusiasm and pioneer spirit reigning in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Rostov, the author was convinced of this personally in 1994, 1995 and 1996. In this regard, one involuntarily recalls the enthusiasm with which in Germany, after the disaster of 1945, throughout the 50s, foreign psychoanalysts were welcomed as they returned psychoanalysis to their homeland. Just as Germany at one time benefited from contacts with psychoanalysts in Great Britain, Holland and the USA, Russian colleagues are gaining lost experience from contacts with Western psychoanalysts.
This book is an adapted introduction to a complex area of knowledge. The motivation for writing it was the lectures and seminars that I gave for twenty years at the University of Frankfurt. Students' questions forced me to look for precise answers, to clarify what was unclear, to try to eliminate contradictions and fill existing gaps. Although there is no scientific (positive) justification for the correctness of the theory and practice of psychoanalysis, nevertheless, the latter constantly justifies itself in practical life. Related disciplines such as sociology, pedagogy, psychotherapy and others also derive obvious benefits from psychoanalysis.
I would like to express my special thanks to Sergei Pankov and Valery Zelensky for their painstaking work in translating and editing the manuscript, Roland Knappe from the Kletg-Kott publishing house for providing the publication rights, the German Inter Nationses foundation for their generous financial support, and the St. Petersburg publishing house “B. S.K.” for his efforts in publishing the book.
A number of Moscow colleagues provided assistance at various stages of the publishing project. I am especially grateful to Marina Igelnik, Yakov Obukhov, Sergei Nazaryan and Aron Belkin.
I hope that the book will find its readers in Russia and will not only help their professional growth, but also bring them a feeling of greater completeness of their own existence.
PETER KUTTER, Stuttgart,
November 1996
Elena Zmanovskaya - Modern psychoanalysis. Theory and practice
1 …
Elena Zmanovskaya
Modern psychoanalysis. Theory and practice
Preface
The truth will set you free.
Z. Freud
Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis became the historical event that radically changed people's ideas about themselves. The emergence of depth psychology, which openly declared the dominance of drives and the existence of infantile sexuality, was met with violent indignation from the conservative-minded public at the beginning of the 20th century. The period of active resistance to psychoanalytic knowledge, fortunately, did not last long and quite soon gave way to a stage of growing interest in it. To date, psychoanalytic ideas have become an integral part of human culture and have found application in almost all spheres of social life. At the same time, due to a number of historical and psychological reasons, the name of Freud remains shrouded in a trail of uncertainty. Common ideas about psychoanalysis are for the most part reduced to simplified and very far from the truth cliches, causing contradictory, and in some cases, unreasonably negative attitudes from people.
Defining what psychoanalysis is, S. Freud pointed out that it simultaneously hides: 1) a method of studying mental processes that are inaccessible to ordinary understanding; 2) method of treating neuroses; 3) a number of psychological theories that arose as a result. The idea of creating a general psychological concept (metapsychology), revealing the basic patterns of human mental life in normal and pathological conditions, never left Freud. As a result of the implementation of this plan, the basic principles of classical psychoanalysis were developed, constituting the theoretical and methodological basis for all subsequent psychoanalytic schools.
In more than a hundred years of its existence, psychoanalysis has undergone dramatic changes. In the field of Sigmund Freud's monotheistic concept, a complex scientific system has grown, including a variety of theoretical views and practical approaches. Modern psychoanalysis is a set of approaches united by a common subject of research, which is the partially or completely unconscious aspects of people’s mental life. The general goal of psychoanalytic work is defined as the liberation of individuals from various unconscious restrictions that cause suffering and block the process of progressive development.
A distinctive feature of psychoanalysis has always been the close connection between theory and practice. Psychoanalysis originated as a method of treating neuroses and developed as a doctrine of unconscious processes, on the foundation of which a scientific and practical system gradually formed, aimed at solving a variety of social problems. In modern psychoanalysis, three interrelated areas are clearly distinguished: psychoanalytic theory, which forms the basis for various practical approaches, clinical psychoanalysis, focused on providing psychological and psychotherapeutic assistance in case of personal difficulties or neuropsychic disorders, and applied psychoanalysis, aimed at analyzing cultural phenomena and solving social tasks.
At this stage of development, psychoanalysis is no longer a monolithic entity, uniting many subsystems within the framework of a general methodology. In this regard, two main paradigms are distinguished: classical (orthodox) psychoanalysis, which consistently develops the ideas proposed by Freud, and modern (heterodox) psychoanalysis, which complements the classical approach with new original concepts and methods. It is not possible to list all modern psychoanalytic theories. Within the framework of the general framework, psychoanalytic schools are distinguished that place emphasis on certain theoretical positions or technical aspects, for example, the Kleinian tradition, the school of Anna Freud, the theory of object relations, ego psychology, Lacanian structural psychoanalysis and others.
As an alternative, but close to psychoanalysis, a psychodynamic approach is being developed, used by numerous consolidated groups, including: Jungians, Adlerians, representatives of transactional analysis and many other researchers, whose original approaches to theory and practice, although they deviate from the main psychoanalytic outline, but have undoubted scientific and practical value.
In relation to psychotherapeutic practice, there are three relatively independent directions: 1) the classical technique of psychoanalysis (psychoanalysis); 2) psychoanalytic therapy; 3) psychodynamic approaches. In the first case, the treatment of individuals is built in maximum accordance with the methodology proposed by Freud; in the second case, some deviations from the classical canons are allowed, for example, by reducing the number of meetings with the patient from five to twice a week; in the third version there are fundamental deviations from the original psychoanalytic technique.
Modern psychoanalysis is a continuously developing system within which the classical heritage is naturally transformed into current knowledge. Any historical era focuses its attention on concepts that reflect the urgent needs of society. If during the period of Freud's work the theory of drives and the concept of infantile sexuality were especially popular, then at present the theory of object relations and ego psychology are the undoubted leaders in the field of psychoanalytic ideas. At the same time, the technique of psychoanalysis is constantly changing.
The listed features of the subject being studied are most fully covered in the specialized literature, among which a special place is occupied by the two-volume work by H. Thome and H. Kächele “Modern Psychoanalysis” (literal translation from German is “Textbook of Psychoanalytic Therapy”). This work is a systematic guide to the use of the theory and methodology of psychoanalysis by practicing psychotherapists. For all its depth and content, the book by Thome and Kaechele, like many other psychoanalytic publications, is aimed at specialists with thorough professional training, but for an untrained reader it is quite difficult, and in some cases simply impossible, to benefit from such literature due to the expressed specificity of the latter.
This work has the same title, but is aimed at a more accessible to a wide audience and at the same time scientifically based description of modern psychoanalysis as a dynamically developing system that integrates psychoanalytic theories and their practical application.
The book consists of three parts. The first chapter introduces the basic concepts of psychoanalysis. Here are the basic concepts of Sigmund Freud, creating a unified context for the entire psychoanalytic system. The second chapter of the first part contains an analysis of the views of Freud and his followers on social processes that form the basis of modern applied psychoanalysis.
The second part of the book is devoted to a discussion of modern schools of psychoanalysis, most of which are focused on solving clinical problems. The term clinical psychoanalysis, although not fully reflecting the reality it denotes, is sufficiently ingrained in people’s minds to designate the “therapeutic” goals of psychoanalysis. The modern practice of psychoanalysis has gone far beyond the boundaries of the treatment of neuroses. Despite the fact that neurotic symptoms are still considered as an indication for the use of classical techniques, modern psychoanalysis finds adequate methods of helping people with a wide variety of problems - from ordinary psychological difficulties to severe mental disorders.
The second chapter of the second part reveals the principles and features of the organization of certain forms of clinical psychoanalysis using the example of two main options: classical technique and modern psychoanalytic therapy. Practice shows that psychoanalysts, initially focused on individual work with the patient, are beginning to increasingly recognize the importance of couples counseling and family psychotherapy. This relatively new application of psychoanalysis became relevant in the 1960s and 1970s due to the emerging trend of a crisis in the traditional patriarchal family model. Currently, relationship therapy is in demand by society and can be considered as expanding the analyst’s capabilities in solving therapeutic problems.
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INTRODUCTION
Why is another introduction to psychoanalysis necessary?
We proceed from the fact that numerous introductions to psychoanalysis need clarification. In other words, some of them, such as the popular works of Charles Brenner (1967), Gustav Bally (1961), or Lawrence S. Kuby (1956), have already become outdated. In this regard, new works appeared on the book market: “Depth Psychology” by Siegfried Elhard (1971), “Fundamental Course of Psychoanalysis” by Sebastian Goppert (1978), “Introduction to the Doctrine of Neuroses and Psychosomatic Medicine” by Sven Olaf Hoffmann and Gerd Hohapfel (1984 ); excellent up-to-date overview of psychoanalysis by Wolfgang Mertens (1981), concise and accurate information on psychoanalysis from the Frankfurt Sigmund Freud Institute (Muck et al., 1974). Developments in the book market include the “Textbook of Psychoanalytic Therapy” by Helmut Thome and Horst Kächel (1985), the first volume of which (“Basic Provisions”), compiled in collaboration with many scientists, introduces not only the basic principles of psychoanalysis, but also sets out in detail the essence of such special concepts as transference, correspondence, displacement, primary interview and dream interpretation develops certain rules of psychoanalytic therapy, deeply and thoroughly reveals the paths of development and goals of psychoanalysis.
The Institute of Psychoanalysis at the Faculty of Psychology of the University of Frankfurt, where I have taught since 1974, has a large selection of psychoanalytic literature; This is a good help for psychology students who, along with the classical psychological disciplines - psychological diagnostics, clinical psychology, educational psychology - take exams in professional and organizational psychology, as well as in psychoanalysis. Some of the books listed are suitable for these purposes; some, as it turns out in the process of working with students, are often not suitable for educational purposes. A number of monographs have been written on individual exam topics that are studied within the framework of psychoanalysis (such as the theory of personality and the doctrine of diseases), the vast majority of which are too difficult for students.
Future psychoanalysts are unlikely to get by with a university education. Students of the main course (psychology) and a parallel course (psychoanalysis) can and should receive fundamental information about the theory and practice of psychoanalysis, personality theory, the doctrine of illnesses, the theory of mental disorders, psychoanalytic methods of treatment and counseling, as well as the countless possibilities of applying psychoanalysis to social life and politics, to literature and art, to anthropology and philosophy. For a long time, I was content to have students study at least one book in each of these areas in preparation for the exam, but this kind of workload turned out to be excessive (compared to other disciplines) due to the comprehensive nature of the subject matter.
This consideration became the starting point for my work on an introduction to psychoanalysis, which, on the one hand, would complement the condensed information of the books of Charles Brenner, Wolfgang Mertens and the group of authors of the Sigmund Freud Institute, and on the other hand, would not pretend to be a textbook, most of which written, strictly speaking, for practicing psychoanalysts. Examples of such textbooks include the fifth edition of Wolfgang Loch’s “Psychoanalytic Theory of Illness” and Helmut Thome and Horst Kächel’s “Textbook of Psychoanalytic Therapy.”
In thinking about the content of this book, I was primarily guided by the interests of the students who have attended my lectures and seminars at the University of Frankfurt since 1974. This is how a scientifically based introduction to psychoanalysis appeared, which is intended for a wide range of readers and at the same time can serve as a guide for those who work in the field of social psychology and medicine. All readers interested in psychoanalysis and psychology will receive the necessary information when reading the book, regardless of their own studies, be it social work, medicine, psychology or some other field of activity.
However, the book will be useful for both final year students and practicing psychoanalysts. It will allow them to get a general idea of the subject and refresh their memory of existing knowledge, and partly expand it.
The aims and contents of this book differ in many respects from my previous work Psychoanalysis—Evidence, Methods, Theory and Application (Kutter, 1984), in which I compared numerous articles of recent years. in order to trace what exactly in psychoanalysis justified itself and what did not. In addition, I touched on the most important aspects of psychoanalysis as a method and theory. As for the practical application of psychoanalysis, I considered only those aspects of it that interested me at that moment, in particular, the contribution of psychoanalysis to group therapy and to solving social problems.
This book will talk about something else. The material from which it arose were lecture and seminar notes that had crystallized so much during endless discussions with university students that they literally cried out to become a book.
Classic psychoanalysis. Theory and practice.
⇐ PreviousPage 2 of 20Next ⇒Sigmund Freud made a truly invaluable contribution to the development of psychology. He became the founder of psychoanalysis ( depth psychology ), using the term for the first time in an 1891 work. Freud used the word “psychoanalysis” to refer to a theory of personality as well as a method of treating mental disorders. Freud's theory is also called the psychodynamic theory of personality, since it focuses on the dynamics and conflicting aspects of mental processes. Psychodynamic theories are based on two main postulates. Firstly , people often have no idea about the true motives of their behavior; in other words, the motives for their behavior are often located in the area of the unconscious. Secondly , defense mechanisms are used to protect the psyche from the effects of unpleasant or unwanted thoughts and emotions.
Freud's views can be divided into three areas:
is a method of treating functional mental illnesses,
— theory of personality and
- theory of society. The core of the entire system is his views on the development and structure of human personality.
Freud believed that nothing in a person’s mental life happens without a reason. The foundations of mental activity are laid in the unconscious sphere of a person, and the characteristics of the psyche are formed in early childhood. The structure of the psyche coincides with the structure of the personality; The psyche consists of 3 main blocks:
-unconscious “id ”;
-conscious “ego ”;
-superconscious “ super-ego ”.
Instincts (unconscious):
-aggressive - tonic (desire for death);
-supportive (“eros”) - the energy of life - psychosexual. Libido is that specific energy that is associated with the life instinct. Freud did not give his own name to the energy associated with the instinct of death and aggression, but constantly spoke about its existence.
The distribution of energy— cathexis —occurs in early childhood. The process of cathecting is the process of transition from one state to another; from tonic energy to supporting energy and vice versa.
Our “ I ” strives for pleasure, our life is built on this.
Thus, from his point of view, the development of the psyche is adaptation, adaptation to the surrounding, hostile environment. The driving forces of mental development are innate and unconscious drives (feelings). The basis of mental development is a person’s emotions and motives.
The ability to maintain one’s mental health depends on psychological defense mechanisms that help a person, if not prevent, then at least mitigate the conflict between the Id and the Super-Ego. The main defense mechanisms are the following:
1. Repression is the most ineffective mechanism, because in this case the energy of a repressed and unfulfilled motive (desire) is not realized in activity, but remains in a person, causing an increase in tension, which makes itself felt in the form of symbols that fill our dreams, in in the form of errors, typos, and slips.
2. Regression - a temporary transition to an earlier, primitive level of mental development, as if a retreat in that psychological period when a person felt most protected (for example, a child crying in an adult, biting nails, chewing gum or tobacco, believing in evil spirits or good ones...).
3. Rationalization - attributing incorrect but convenient reasons to one’s behavior that do not harm self-esteem. Not realizing the real motives of his behavior, he covers them up and explains them with fictitious, but morally acceptable motives.
4. Projection - attributing to others those desires and feelings that a person experiences himself. If the subject to whom any feeling was attributed confirms the projection made by his behavior, this protective mechanism operates quite successfully. This protective mechanism made it possible to further develop the so-called projective methods of personality research (asking to complete unfinished phrases or stories or compose a story based on vague plot pictures).
5. The most effective defense mechanism is sublimation , that is, the transfer of unrealized energy to other areas - work, creativity, sports. The success of creative activity is explained by the fact that in it there is a complete realization of accumulated energy, catharsis (cleansing) of a person from it. Based on this approach to sublimation, the foundations of art therapy were later developed in psychology.
Libidinal energy is the basis for the development of personality, human character, and, accordingly, the patterns of its development. Freud created his own periodization. Stages of psychosexual development:
1. From 0 - 1 year - libido - object , the child needs a foreign object to realize libido. This stage is called the oral stage.
2. Libido is a subject ; to satisfy his instincts, the child does not require any external object, a period of narcissism:
a) up to 3 years - anal stage;
b) 3 - 5 years - phallic stage - identification of oneself among others, complexes appear: Electra, Oedipus complex.
c) latent (hidden ) - up to 12, 13 years - the main types of socially useful activities.
3. Libido is an object , because to satisfy the libidinal drive, a person again needs a partner. This stage is also called the genital stage (the object of attraction is the opposite sex).
Freud considered libidinal energy to be the basis for the development of not only the individual, but also society. He wrote that the leader of the tribe is a kind of his father, towards whom men experience an Oedipus complex, striving to take his place. Taboos regulate people's social behavior. Later, Freud's followers created a system of ethnopsychological concepts that explained the peculiarities of the psyche of various peoples by the ways of passing through the main stages in the development of libido.
In his psychotherapy, Freud proceeded from the fact that the doctor takes the place of parents for the patient, the dominant position of which he recognizes, of course. The basis of recovery is suggestion; such therapy was called directive.
Classical psychoanalysis is considered the most intensive and rigorous type of psychotherapy. The patient visits a psychoanalyst three to five times a week, and the treatment course itself lasts months, or even years. The patient lies on the couch and does not see the psychoanalyst sitting behind him. (The use of the proverbial couch emphasizes that psychoanalysis is a specialized form of communication.) The main goal of psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy is to help the client understand the causes of internal conflicts that arise as a result of contradictory childhood experiences and manifest themselves both as symptoms and the formation of certain painful patterns of behavior and interpersonal interaction in adulthood. According to the concept of psychoanalysis, the unconscious is denied access to consciousness, at the threshold of which there is “censorship.” Repressed drives do not lose their energy and constantly strive to make their way into consciousness, but they can do this only partially, through compromise and distortion. They can be studied in the process of psychoanalysis. For this purpose, four different procedures are used, such as confrontation, clarification (“clarification”), interpretation, and careful elaboration.
The most important procedure is interpretation; all the others are either subordinate to it or lead to it, making it effective. Psychoanalytic methods, thus, come down to an interpretive analysis of “compromise” formations of consciousness, which manifest themselves in a number of very common everyday life actions (such as slips of the tongue, erroneous actions, forgetting words and names, etc.).
The material for psychoanalysis, in addition to the elaboration of direct experience, is dreams, childhood memories, as well as the direct relationship between the patient and the therapist (here the transfer of the patient’s early childhood feelings to the psychoanalyst plays an important role). Thus, we see that in a narrow sense, psychoanalysis can be understood as a type of psychotherapy, which is based on clear ideas about the nature and essence of man. We can say that Freud went from practice to establishing certain patterns and creating a theory, and from theory to improving his psychotherapeutic method, which in itself is very significant.
1. Free association analysis.
According to 3. Freud, in free associations a person does not repeat the conflict content, but regresses, following the traces of actual experience. Returning to early conflicts, the patient, together with the psychoanalyst, observes where the thread of free association will lead him.
The classic procedure is as follows. The patient lies down on the couch, the psychoanalyst sits at the head so that the patient does not see him. The patient is asked to come to a state of calm introspection and, without hesitation, communicate everything that comes to his mind, without giving in to the desire to discard anything. In the content of free associations (thoughts and feelings, dreams and fantasies), the repressed unconscious comes to the surface. During free association, the patient learns to reproduce the traumatic experience. Reduced sensory activity (psychanalyst out of sight, relaxed posture) makes it possible to express repressed emotions and feelings.
The psychoanalyst remains neutral, taking neither an approving nor a criticizing position. His task is to listen to the patient, observe his speech, body movements, and facial expressions. During the session, he is usually silent, even when the patient turns to him with a question. When the question passes through various levels of understanding, the patient himself becomes able to answer it and resolve his internal conflict.
2. ■ “Freudian error*.” Mistakes (slips of the tongue, slips of the tongue) are an opportunity to penetrate the subconscious. They point us to forgotten places, to thoughts interrupted at the most important point, to behavior that is constantly repeated unconsciously, etc. Sometimes they are difficult to decipher, but free association makes it possible to understand the hidden meaning of clauses with a high probability.
3. Dream analysis. Freud called dreams “the royal road to the unconscious.” He viewed them as a translation of the hidden (latent) content of the unconscious into the language of symbols. Hidden content refers to repressed desires. The true, explicit content of a dream can be revealed through condensation, displacement and secondary processing.
Condensation -
it is a combination of different elements, their superimposition on each other in one fragment of a dream.
Displacement random
elements that have little connection with the main content of the dream fragment in which the unconscious experience is manifested.
Secondary processing is
a process as a result of which a dream acquires integrity and coherence by correcting inconsistencies, filling in gaps, etc.
The psychoanalyst perceives dream images as a rebus, a riddle that he must solve. Most images, according to Freud's views, are universal in nature and have a sexual nature. To analyze a dream, you need to divide it into elements and find out the associations associated with each of them.
4. Resistance analysis. Resistance is understood as all emotions, words, ideas, impulses, thoughts, fantasies that oppose the procedures and processes of psychoanalysis. For example, while telling an analyst about his life, the client suddenly stopped and could not say a word further. This blocking is a small example of resistance.
5. Analysis of the content of the transfer. Transfer, according to R. Greenson, is a special type of object relations. Transference is understood as the experience of feelings towards a person that are actually addressed to another person. The client reacts to a real person as if it were a person from his past.
Transference reactions are most likely to occur in relation to people who perform functions similar to those of parents. For example, doctors, teachers, actors, leaders, lovers especially activate the occurrence of transference reactions.
All people have transference reactions. The analytical situation contributes to their development. The analyst does not tell the client anything about himself and his personal life, remaining a screen for his projections. Therefore, all fantasies, feelings, drives, and ideas of the client about the analyst are subject to analysis, interpretation and reconstruction, making it possible to find out what real object in the client’s life they are addressed to.
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"New Old Criticism" of Psychoanalysis
The impetus for writing this book was also the numerous critical articles that have appeared recently that take psychoanalysis into the crossfire of derogatory criticism that should literally destroy it. Twenty years ago, at a press conference for Psychotherapy Week in Lindau, in the presence of the annual guild of academic (mostly non-psychoanalytic) psychologists who gather here, one journalist predicted that in just ten years, “Freudian psychoanalysis” would lose all meaning and give way to place for such new directions in psychology as behavioral therapy, cognitive psychology and learning theory. In 1969, journalist Ruprecht Skaza-Weiss quoted in the newspaper Stuptarter Zeitung (No. 110, p. 37) the diagnosis of the famous Hamburg psychologist and psychotherapist Reinhard Tausch, which sounded like this: “Death in ten years.” The prophecies did not come true. Psychoanalysis has existed and continues to exist to this day, and has advanced in many ways. However, other areas of psychology do not stand still.
The situation in the field of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis has changed dramatically over the past ten years. Now they are no longer looking for an explanation of everything high and low in the human soul on the intricate paths of psychoanalytic interpretation, but, on the contrary, are placing emphasis on experimental and natural scientific methods, on a series of scientific experiments, thanks to which students of American colleges, as well as students of German psychological departments of universities, master everything a large number of reliable and serious analytical research methods. The consequence of this is the transition from a purely statistical approach to numerical estimates and the identification of deviation norms. Of course, in this way you can find out a lot of interesting details that... however, they have too little practical significance for therapy.
On the contrary, the theory and practice of psychoanalysis find application in everyday work, in psychoanalytic consultations, in psychotherapeutic and psychosomatic clinics, and in the work of freely practicing psychotherapists. It is a living, renewing organism. Critics blame psychoanalysis for its lack of scientific validity and poor effectiveness of treatment methods. But attempts to present psychoanalysis as “profound charlatanism”, as does Dieter E. Zimmer (1986), to prove, like Hans Jürgen Eysenck (1985), the complete ineffectiveness of its methods, or to characterize it as an anti-scientific theory - this is the overall message of Christoph T. Eschenröder’s book “Here Freud was wrong” (1984) - are unfounded simply because the results obtained by psychoanalytic means are verified by methods that are the opposite of psychoanalysis and are not applicable to unconscious processes.
Eysenck and other critics of psychoanalysis are excellent experts in the statistical methods of the psychology of perception, the psychology of learning and the psychology of memory. They are well aware of the psychology of cognition, the psychology of motivation and the psychology of emotions. Using these methods, however, they lose sight of just that. what psychoanalysis does, namely unconscious processes and how they occur in the “dark recesses of the soul” between an externally observed stimulus, on the one hand, and discharge, on the other. Critics of psychoanalysis deal with unconscious processes approximately in the same way as physicists would do if they decided to use the means of classical physics (mechanics, electronics) to answer the questions of modern theoretical physics, for example, the theory of the atomic nucleus.
In order not to respond to the polemical “Attack on the Empire of King Oedipus” (Der Spiegel, 1984) with an equally polemical presentation, the theory, methods and application of psychoanalysis should be clearly and scientifically substantiated, and in order to benefit from the fruits of this work, a certain impartiality is necessary. A reader who holds views opposed to psychoanalysis will most likely perceive this book as just another exposition of psychoanalytic theory. But if this book's unpretentious treatment of the subject makes even a few skeptics question their own position, then its main purpose will have been achieved.
