Anticathexis
In psychoanalysis, anticathexis, or countercathexis, is the energy used by the ego to bind the primitive impulses of the Id. Sometimes the ego follows the instructions of the superego in doing so; sometimes however it develops a double-countercathexis, so as to block feelings of guilt and anxiety deriving from the superego, as well as id impulses. Repression and isolation Freud saw the establishment of a permanent anticathexis as a prerequisite for successful psychological repression. He also saw countercathexis as playing a central role in isolation. In a late work, Freud further distinguished between the external anticathexis of repression and what he called “internal anticathexis" (i.e. alteration of the ego through reaction formation In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation (german: Reaktionsbildung) is a defense mechanism in which emotions and impulses which are anxiety-producing or perceived to be unacceptable are mastered by exaggeration of the directly opposing te ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Body Cathexis
Body cathexis is defined as the degree of satisfaction or dissatisfaction one feels towards various parts and aspects of their own body.Jourard, S. M., & Secord, P.F. (1955). Body cathexis and the ideal female figure. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 50(2), 243-246. This evaluative dimension of body image is dependent on a person's investment of mental and emotional energy in body size, parts, shape, processes, and functions, and is integral to one's sense of self-concept. First recognized by Jourard and Secord, body cathexis is assessed by examining correlations between measures of self-concept or esteem and bodily attitudes. An individual's evaluation of their own body tends to drive various behaviors, including clothing choices and weight management, and the existence of a universal ideal for certain dimensions of body type is, in many cases, a source of anxiety and insecurity. While the body has been studied by psychologists from numerous different viewpoints, few ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Acathexis
Acathexis is a psychoanalytic term for a lack of emotional response to significant memories or actual interactions, where such a response would normally be expected. The term also refers more broadly to a general absence of normal or expected feelings. Acathexis has been linked to anxiety, bipolar disorder and dementia, while the phenomenon also appears in posttraumatic stress disorder Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental and behavioral disorder that can develop because of exposure to a traumatic event, such as sexual assault, warfare, traffic collisions, child abuse, domestic violence, or other threats on ....D. Goleman, ''Emotional Intelligence'' (1996) p. 206 See also References {{Reflist, 2} Further reading * P. Sifeos, 'Affect. Emotional Conflicts, and Deficits' ''Psychotherapy-and-Psychosomatics'' 56 (1991) 116-22 Psychoanalytic terminology Freudian psychology ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Cathexis
In psychoanalysis, cathexis (or emotional investment) is defined as the process of allocation of mental or emotional energy to a person, object, or idea. Origin of term The Greek term ''cathexis'' (κάθεξις) was chosen by James Strachey to render the German term ''Besetzung'' in his translation of Sigmund Freud's complete works. Freud himself used the word "interest" in English in an early letter to Ernest Jones. Peter Gay objected that Strachey's use of cathexis was an unnecessarily esoteric replacement for Freud's use of ''Besetzung'' – "a word from common German speech rich in suggestive meanings, among them 'occupation' (by troops) and 'charge' (of electricity)", of which the latter is an incorrect claim by Gay (as can be confirmed by looking in any German dictionary). Apparently Gay was confused by the common use of the English noun and verb "charge" to refer to both "allocation/allocating" and the "energy" allocated in cathexis, e.g. "emotional charge", "counter ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Decathexis
In psychoanalysis, decathexis is the withdrawal of cathexis from an idea or instinctual object. Decathexis is the process of dis-investment of mental or emotional energy in a person, object, or idea. Narcissism In narcissistic neurosis, cathexis is withdrawn from external instinctual objects (or rather their unconscious representations) and turned on the ego – a process Freud highlighted in the Schreber case, and linked to the subject's ensuing megalomania. A similar decathexis of energy has been linked to the emergence of symptoms of hypochondriasis, as well as of melancholia. André Green saw decathexis as the product of the death drive In classical Freudian psychoanalytic theory, the death drive (german: Todestrieb) is the drive toward death and destruction, often expressed through behaviors such as aggression, repetition compulsion, and self-destructiveness.Eric Berne, ''Wha ..., blanking out the possibility of thinking by a process of what he called de-objectiliz ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Psychoanalysis
PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: + . is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques"What is psychoanalysis? Of course, one is supposed to answer that it is many things — a theory, a research method, a therapy, a body of knowledge. In what might be considered an unfortunately abbreviated description, Freud said that anyone who recognizes transference and resistance is a psychoanalyst, even if he comes to conclusions other than his own.… I prefer to think of the analytic situation more broadly, as one in which someone seeking help tries to speak as freely as he can to someone who listens as carefully as he can with the aim of articulating what is going on between them and why. David Rapaport (1967a) once defined the analytic situation as carrying the method of interpersonal relationship to its last consequences." Gill, Merton M. 1999.Psychoanalysis, Part 1: Proposals for the Future" ''The Challenge for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy: Solutions for the Future''. New York: Americ ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Id, Ego And Super-ego
The id, ego, and super-ego are a set of three concepts in psychoanalytic theory describing distinct, interacting agents in the psychic apparatus (defined in Sigmund Freud's structural model of the psyche). The three agents are theoretical constructs that describe the activities and interactions of the mental life of a person. In the ego psychology model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual desires; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic agent that mediates between the instinctual desires of the id and the critical super-ego; Freud explained that: The functional importance of the ego is manifested in the fact that, normally, control over the approaches to motility devolves upon it. Thus, in its relation to the id, he egois like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to do so with his own strength, while the ego uses b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Ego, Superego, And Id
The id, ego, and super-ego are a set of three concepts in psychoanalytic theory describing distinct, interacting agents in the psychic apparatus (defined in Sigmund Freud's structural model of the psyche). The three agents are theoretical constructs that describe the activities and interactions of the mental life of a person. In the ego psychology model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual desires; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic agent that mediates between the instinctual desires of the id and the critical super-ego; Freud explained that: The functional importance of the ego is manifested in the fact that, normally, control over the approaches to motility devolves upon it. Thus, in its relation to the id, he egois like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to do so with his own strength, while the ego uses b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Superego
The id, ego, and super-ego are a set of three concepts in psychoanalytic theory describing distinct, interacting agents in the psychic apparatus (defined in Sigmund Freud's structural model of the psyche). The three agents are theoretical constructs that describe the activities and interactions of the mental life of a person. In the ego psychology model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual desires; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic agent that mediates between the instinctual desires of the id and the critical super-ego; Freud explained that: The functional importance of the ego is manifested in the fact that, normally, control over the approaches to motility devolves upon it. Thus, in its relation to the id, he egois like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to do so with his own strength, while the ego uses b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts in the psyche, through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst. Freud was born to Galician Jewish parents in the Moravian town of Freiberg, in the Austrian Empire. He qualified as a doctor of medicine in 1881 at the University of Vienna. Upon completing his habilitation in 1885, he was appointed a docent in neuropathology and became an affiliated professor in 1902. Freud lived and worked in Vienna, having set up his clinical practice there in 1886. In 1938, Freud left Austria to escape Nazi persecution. He died in exile in the United Kingdom in 1939. In founding psychoanalysis, Freud developed therapeutic techniques such as the use of free association and discovered transference, establishing its central role in the analytic proces ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Psychological Repression
Repression is a key concept of psychoanalysis, where it is understood as a defence mechanism that "ensures that what is unacceptable to the conscious mind, and would if recalled arouse anxiety, is prevented from entering into it." According to psychoanalytic theory, repression plays a major role in many mental illnesses, and in the psyche of the average person.Laplanche pp. 390, 392 There has been debate as to whether (or how often) memory repression really occurs and mainstream psychology holds that true memory repression occurs infrequently. American psychologists began to attempt to study repression in the experimental laboratory around 1930. However, psychoanalysts were at first uninterested in attempts to study repression in laboratory settings, and later came to reject them. Most psychoanalysts concluded that such attempts misrepresented the psychoanalytic concept of repression. Sigmund Freud's theory As Sigmund Freud moved away from hypnosis, and towards urging his patient ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Isolation (psychology)
Isolation (german: Isolierung) is a defence mechanism in psychoanalytic theory first proposed by Sigmund Freud. While related to repression, the concept distinguishes itself in several ways. It is characterized as a mental process involving the creation of a gap between an unpleasant or threatening cognition, and other thoughts and feelings. By minimizing associative connections with other thoughts, the threatening cognition is remembered less often and is less likely to affect self-esteem or the self concept. Freud illustrated the concept with the example of a person beginning a train of thought and then pausing for a moment before continuing to a different subject. His theory stated that by inserting an interval the person was "letting it be understood symbolically that he will not allow his thoughts about that impression or activity to come into associative contact with other thoughts." As a defense against harmful thoughts, isolation prevents the self from allowing the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Reaction Formation
In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation (german: Reaktionsbildung) is a defense mechanism in which emotions and impulses which are anxiety-producing or perceived to be unacceptable are mastered by exaggeration of the directly opposing tendency. Charles Rycroft, ''A Critical Dictionary of Psychoanalysis'' (London, 2nd Edn, 1995) The reaction formations belong to Level 3 of neurotic defense mechanisms, which also include dissociation, displacement, intellectualization, and repression. Theory Reaction formation depends on the hypothesis that " e instincts and their derivatives may be arranged as pairs of opposites: life versus death, construction versus destruction, action versus passivity, dominance versus submission, and so forth. When one of the instincts produces anxiety by exerting pressure on the ego either directly or by way of the superego, the ego may try to sidetrack the offending impulse by concentrating upon its opposite. For example, if feelings of hate towards a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |