Psychoanalysis and Neuroscience – A Disclosure

Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 1980

Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, expressed a wish many times that points of contact between his theories and biology could be established. He surmised that there were chemical substances which would one day be shown to make up the somatic factor of the libido, the name he used for the psychic representative of the sexual instinct [1, p. 78; 2]. Although by assuming this he foresaw in a way the discovery of the sexual hormones, the latter have not provided the required link. Modern neurophysiology, with the functional and highly flexible phenomena it deals with, is obviously much better suited for the purpose of bridging the gap between the "psychic" and the "biological." Attempts to study the findings of neurophysiology in the light of psychoanalytic observations have been negligible however. This is perhaps partly explained by the fact that during the lifetime of Freud neurophysiology was still in its infancy and prospects for integrative research were not good. Freud himself, however, made a major effort in this direction, but he discarded the result and never published it [3]. Since that time, our understanding of the physiology and chemistry of the brain has grown immensely, and the possibility of revealing such connections has considerably increased. There has been little convergence, however, in the development of the two fields. This is no doubt partly because of general trends in the culture of the twentieth Translated by Antony Landon.

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2012

Benjamin concluded her presentation by sharing that the intersubjective perspective proposed in this evening ' s talk did not attempt to refute the importance of gender signifi ers, but was presented to shed some light on the origin of such signifi ers. Because Benjamin suggested that gender identifi ers originate in early diffi culties related to overstimulation and regulation as well as attachment trauma, she proposed that psychoanalytic practice could begin to address these early attachment diffi culties by creating a third space in the therapeutic relationship, which would serve to contain excess in the intersubjective experience of the psychoanalytic dyad.

Each employed their own dreams in rather different ways: as part of an assessment of Freud's work as a psychological theory, as illustrative of the cogency of Freud's method and theories as part of the psychoanalytic process. Each adopted different approaches to the question of privacy and decorum. The paper argues that assessment of the impact of Freud's work must take account of the application of the method to the researcher's own dreams and the personal impact this process of analysis had upon them, and must also gauge how the dreamers' deployment of Freud's methods influenced their explicit relationship to him and his theories.

International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2002

The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2020

Using conversation analysis of audio recorded psychoanalytic sessions, this article investigates dream interpretation as conversational practice. We focus on the ways in which the "real world" meanings of objects or events in the dream are collaboratively created. Three routes for the meaning creation were found. (1) In plain assertions, either the analyst or the patient asserts the meaning of a dream element, for example stating that the cow in the dream means women. (2) In meaning creation through redescription, the analyst describes anew events belonging to the real world or the dream, which have been referred to in the earlier conversation. This redescription makes possible the subsequent assertion of explicit linkages between the dream and the real world. In the merging of referential worlds, the analyst extends the patient's real-world description with images that are recognisably from the dream: the world of the dream and the real world are thus momentarily merged. In discussion, we point out that in our audio recorded data, the dream interpretation does not primarily involve revealing repressed and unconscious ideas, but rather it involves reminding the patient of something that the patient already knows but is reluctant to think or talk about.

The advance of scientific knowledge has not left The Interpretation of Dreams untouched. When I wrote this book in 1899 there was as yet no "sexual theory," and the analysis of the more complicated forms of the psychoneuroses was still in its infancy. The interpretation of dreams was intended as an expedient to facilitate the psychological analysis of the neuroses; but since then a profounder understanding of the neuroses has contributed towards the comprehension of the dream. The doctrine of dream-interpretation itself has evolved in a direction which was insufficiently emphasized in the first edition of this book. From my own experience, and the works of Stekel and other writers, [1] I have since learned to appreciate more accurately the significance of symbolism in dreams (or rather, in unconscious thought). In the course of years, a mass of data has accumulated which demands consideration.

Dreaming, 1994

International Journal of Dream Research, 2019

This article aims at facilitating the understanding of Freud´s dream theory for psychoanalytic as well as non-psychoanalytic clinicians and scientists. The new perspective is based on a section of An Outline of Psychoanalysis (Freud, 1938) which, to date, does not appear to have been considered adequately. This section comprises a dense summary of Freud´s dream theory applying the structural viewpoint (ego, id and super-ego). It is suggested that this section be considered as akin to a set of explanatory notes for the reading of The Interpretation of Dreams (Freud, 1900), which is illustrated herein by applying it to several paragraphs of this work. In doing so, it becomes apparent that The Interpretation of Dreams does not need to be re-written in order to integrate the structural viewpoint. Rather, both the topographical (conscious, preconscious and unconscious) and the structural viewpoint can be elegantly merged. Finally, the introduced perspective is compared to previous psycho...

Sigmund Freud, 1900

Wheras there was a space of nine years between the first and second editions of this book, the need of a third edition was apparent when little more than a year had elapsed. I ought to be gratified by this change; but if I was unwilling previously to attribute the neglect of my work to its small value, I cannot take the interest which is now making its appearance as proof of its quality. But the very context to which our subject owes its importance must be held responsible for the deficiencies of the following chapters. The abundant lacunae in this exposition represent so many points of contact at which the problem of dream-formation is linked up with the more comprehensive problems of psycho-pathology; problems which cannot be treated in these pages, but which, if time and powers suffice and if further material presents itself, may be elaborated elsewhere. The peculiar nature of the material employed to exemplify the interpretation of dreams has made the writing even of this treatise a difficult task. Consideration of the methods of dream-interpretation will show why the dreams recorded in the literature on the subject, or those collected by persons unknown to me, were useless for my purpose; I had only the choice between my own dreams and those of the patients whom I was treating by psychoanalytic methods. But this later material was inadmissible, since the dream-processes were undesirably complicated by the intervention of neurotic characters. And if I relate my own dreams I must inevitably reveal to the gaze of strangers more of the intimacies of my psychic life than is agreeable to me, and more than seems fitting in a writer who is not a poet but a scientific investigator. To do so is painful, but unavoidable; I have submitted to the necessity, for otherwise I could not have demonstrated my psychological conclusions. Sometimes, of course, I could not resist the temptation to mitigate my indiscretions by omissions and substitutions; but wherever I have done so the value of the example cited has been very definitely diminished. I can only express the hope that my readers will understand my difficult position, and will be indulgent; and further, that all those persons who are in any way concerned in the dreams recorded will not seek to forbid our dream-life at all events to exercise freedom of thought! The Interpretation of Dreams CHAPTER 1 THE SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE OF DREAM-PROBLEMS (UP TO 1900) In the following pages I shall demonstrate that there is a psychological technique which makes it possible to interpret dreams, and that on the application of this technique every dream will reveal itself as a psychological structure, full of significance, and one which may be assigned to a specific place in the psychic activities of the waking state. Further, I shall endeavour to elucidate the processes which underlie the strangeness and obscurity of dreams, and to deduce from these processes the nature of the psychic forces whose conflict or cooperation is responsible for our dreams. This done, my investigation will terminate, as it will have reached the point where the problem of the dream merges into more comprehensive problems, and to solve these we must have recourse to material of a different kind. I shall begin by giving a short account of the views of earlier writers on this subject, and of the status of the dream-problem in contemporary science; since in the course of this treatise I shall not often have occasion to refer to either. In spite of thousands of years of endeavour, little progress has been made in the scientific understanding of dreams. This fact has been so universally acknowledged by previous writers on the subject that it seems hardly necessary to quote individual opinions. The reader will find, in the works listed at the end of this work, many stimulating observations, and plenty of interesting material relating to our subject, but little or nothing that concerns the true nature of the dream, or that solves definitely any of its enigmas. The educated layman, of course, knows even less of the matter. The conception of the dream that was held in prehistoric ages by primitive peoples, and the influence which it may have exerted on the formation of their conceptions of the universe, and of the soul, is a theme of such great interest that it is only with reluctance that I refrain from dealing with it in these pages. I will refer the reader to the well-known works of Sir John Lubbock (Lord Avebury), Herbert Spencer, E. B. Tylor, and other writers; I will only add that we shall not realize the importance of these problems and speculations until we have completed the task of dreaminterpretation that lies before us. A reminiscence of the concept of the dream that was held in primitive times seems to underlie the evaluation of the dream which was current among the peoples of classical antiquity.[1] They took it for granted that dreams were related to the world of the supernatural beings in whom they believed, and that they brought inspirations from the gods and demons. Moreover, it appeared to them that dreams must serve a special purpose in respect of the dreamer; that, as a rule, they predicted the future. The extraordinary variations in the content of dreams, and in the impressions which they produced on the dreamer, made it, of course, very difficult to formulate a coherent conception of them, and necessitated manifold differentiations and group-formations, according to their value and reliability. The valuation of dreams by the individual philosophers of antiquity naturally depended on the importance which they were prepared to attribute to manticism in general. In the two works of Aristotle in which there is mention of dreams, they are already regarded as constituting a problem of psychology. We are told Hildebrandt (p. 23): "It has already been expressly admitted that a dream sometimes brings back to the mind, with a wonderful power of reproduction, remote and even forgotten experiences from the earliest periods of one's life." Strumpell (p. 40): "The subject becomes more interesting still when we remember how the dream sometimes drags out, as it were, from the deepest and densest psychic deposits which later years have piled upon the earliest experiences of childhood, the pictures of certain persons, places and things, quite intact, and in all their original freshness. This is confined not merely to such impressions as were vividly perceived at the time of their occurrence, or were associated with intense psychological values, to recur later in the dream as actual reminiscences which give pleasure to the waking mind. On the contrary, the depths of the dream-memory rather contain such images of persons, places, things and early experiences as either possessed but little consciousness and no psychic value whatsoever, or have long since lost both, and therefore appear totally strange and unknown, both in the dream and in the waking state, until their early origin is revealed." Volkelt (p. 119): "It is especially to be remarked how readily infantile and youthful reminiscences enter into our dreams. What we have long ceased to think about, what has long since lost all importance for us, is constantly recalled by the dream." The control which the dream exercises over material from our childhood, most of which, as is well known, falls into the lacunae of our conscious memory, is responsible for the production of interesting hypermnesic dreams, of which I shall cite a few more examples. Maury relates (p. 92) that as a child he often went from his native city, Meaux, to the neighbouring Trilport, where his father was superintending the construction of a bridge. One night a dream transported him to Trilport and he was once more playing in the streets there. A man approached him, wearing a sort of uniform. Maury asked him his name, and he introduced himself, saying that his name was C, and that he was a bridgeguard. On waking, Maury, who still doubted the actuality of the reminiscence, asked his old servant, who had been with him in his childhood, whether she remembered a man of this name. "Of course," was the reply; "he used to be watchman on the bridge which your father was building then." Maury records another example, which demonstrates no less clearly the reliability of the reminiscences of childhood that emerge in our dreams. M. F., who as a child had lived in Montbrison, decided, after an absence of twenty-five years, to visit his home and the old friends of his family. The night before his departure he dreamt that he had reached his destination, and that near Montbrison he met a man whom he did not know by sight, and who told him that he was M. F., a friend of his father's. The dreamer remembered that as a child he had known a gentleman of this name, but on waking he could no longer recall his features. Several days later, having actually arrived at Montbrison, he found once more the locality of his dream, which he had thought was unknown to him, and there he met a man whom he at once recognized as the M. F. of his dream, with only this difference, that the real person was very much older than his dream-image. Here I might relate one of my own dreams, in which the recalled impression takes the form of an association. In my dream I saw a man whom I recognized, while dreaming, as the doctor of my native town. His face was not distinct, but his features were blended with those of one of my schoolmasters, whom I still meet from time to time. What association there was between the two persons I could not discover on waking, but upon questioning my mother concerning the doctor I learned that he was a one-eyed man. The schoolmaster, whose image in my dream obscured that of the physician, had also only one eye. I had not seen the doctor for thirty-eight years, and as far as I know I had never thought of him in my waking state, although a scar on my chin might have reminded me of his professional...