PSYCHOANALYSIS: FREUDIAN SCHOOL.

by Sigmund Freud
[The term psychoanalysis does not appear (or at least is not indexed) in the Eleventh Edition of the
Encyclopædia Britannica. It occurs in the Twelfth Edition (1922) in such articles as "Behaviorism" and
"Psychotherapy." The first treatment of psychoanalysis as a subject unto itself appeared in the Thirteenth
Edition (1926), and for the article the editor went to the best possible authority, Sigmund Freud.]

Psychoanalysis: Freudian School but it was found that they were not permanent
and that they were dependent on the personal
In the years 1880-2 a Viennese physician, Dr. relation between the patient and the physician.
Josef Breuer (1842-1925), discovered a new Freud, who later proceeded with these
procedure by means of which he relieved a investigations by himself, made an alteration
girl, who was suffering from severe hysteria, in their technique, by replacing hypnosis by
of her various symptoms. The idea occurred to the method of free association. He invented
him that the symptoms were connected with the term "psychoanalysis, " which in the
impressions which she had received during a course of time came to have two meanings: (1)
period of excitement while she was nursing a particular method of treating nervous
her sick father. He therefore induced her, disorders and (2) the science of unconscious
while she was in a state of hypnotic mental processes, which has also been
somnambulism, to search for these appropriately described as "depth-
connections in her memory and to live through psychology."
the "pathogenic" scenes once again without
inhibiting the affects that arose in the process. Subject Matter of Psychoanalysis. --
He found that when she had done this the Psychoanalysis finds a constantly increasing
symptom in question disappeared for good. amount of support as a therapeutic procedure,
owing to the fact that it can do more for
This was at a date before the investigations of certain classes of patients than any other
Charcot and Pierre Janet into the origin of method of treatment. The principal field of its
hysterical symptoms, and Breuer's discovery application is in the milder neuroses--hysteria,
was thus entirely uninfluenced by them. But phobias and obsessional states, but in
he did not pursue the matter any further at the malformations of character and in sexual
time, and it was not until some 10 years later inhibitions or abnormalities it can also bring
that he took it up again in collaboration with about marked improvements or even
Sigmund Freud. In 1895 they published a recoveries. Its influence upon dementia
book, Studien über Hysterie, in which praecox and paranoia is doubtful; on the other
Breuer's discoveries were described and an at- hand, in favourable circumstances it can cope
tempt was made to explain them by the theory with depressive states, even if they are of a se-
of Catharsis. According to that hypothesis, vere type.
hysterical symptoms originate through the
energy of a mental process being withheld In every instance the treatment makes heavy
from conscious influence and being diverted claims upon both the physician and the
into bodily innervation ("Conversion "). A patient: the former requires a special training,
hysterical symptom would thus be a substitute and must devote a long period of time to
for an omitted mental act and a reminiscence exploring the mind of each patient, while the
of the occasion which should have given rise latter must make considerable sacrifices, both
to that act. And, on this view, recovery would material and mental. Nevertheless, all the
be a result of the liberation of the affect that trouble involved is as a rule rewarded by the
had gone astray and of its discharge along a results. Psychoanalysis does not act as a
normal path ("Abreaction "). Cathartic convenient panacea ("cito, tute, jucunde")
treatment gave excellent therapeutic results, upon all psychological disorders. On the
contrary, its application has been instrumental
in making clear for the first time the Pleasure-Pain Principle. --From the economic
difficulties and limitations in the treatment of standpoint psychoanalysis supposes that the
such affections. mental representations of the instincts have a
cathexis of definite quantities of energy, and
The therapeutic results of psychoanalysis that it is the purpose of the mental apparatus to
depend upon the replacement of unconscious hinder any damming-up of these energies and
mental acts by conscious ones and are to keep as low as possible the total amount of
operative in so far as that process has the excitations to which it is subject. The
significance in relation to the disorder under course of mental processes is automatically
treatment. The replacement is effected by regulated by the "pleasure-pain principle ";
overcoming internal resistances in the patient's and pain is thus is some way related to an
mind. The future will probably attribute far increase of excitation and pleasure to a
greater importance to psychoanalysis as the decrease. In the course of development the
science of the unconscious than as a thera- original pleasure principle undergoes a
peutic procedure. modification with reference to the external
world, giving place to the "reality-principle, "
Depth-psychology. --Psychoanalysis, in its whereby the mental apparatus learns to
character of depth-psychology, considers postpone the pleasure of satisfaction and to
mental life from three points of view: the tolerate temporarily feelings of pain.
dynamic, the economic and the topographical.
Mental Topography. --Topographically,
From the first of these standpoints, the psychoanalysis regards the mental apparatus
dynamic one, psychoanalysis derives all as a composite instrument, and endeavours to
mental processes (apart from the reception of determine at what points in it the various
external stimuli) from the interplay of forces, mental processes take place. According to the
which assist or inhibit one another, combine most recent psychoanalytic views, the mental
with one another, enter into compromises with apparatus is composed of an "id, " which is the
one another, etc. All of these forces are reservoir of the instinctive impulses, of an
originally in the nature of instincts ; that is to "ego, " which is the most superficial portion of
say, they have an organic origin. They are the id and one which is modified by the
characterised by possessing an immense influence of the external world, and of a
(somatic) persistence and reserve of power "super-ego, " which develops out of the id,
("repetition-compulsion "); and they are dominates the ego and represents the
represented mentally as images or ideas with inhibitions of instinct characteristic of man.
an affective charge ("cathexis "). In Further, the property of consciousness has a
psychoanalysis, no less than in other sciences, topographical reference; for processes in the id
the theory of instincts is an obscure subject. are entirely unconscious, while consciousness
An empirical analysis leads to the formation is the function of the ego's outermost layer,
of two groups of instincts: the so-called "ego- which is concerned with the perception of the
instincts," which are directed towards self- external world.
preservation and the "object-instincts," which
are concerned with relations to an external ob- At this point two observations may be in
ject. The social instincts are not regarded as place. It must not be supposed that these very
elementary or irreducible. Theoretical general ideas are presuppositions upon which
speculation leads to the suspicion that there the work of psychoanalysis depends. On the
are two fundamental instincts which lie contrary, they are its latest conclusions and are
concealed behind the manifest ego-instincts in every respect open to revision.
and object-instincts: namely (a ) Eros, the Psychoanalysis is founded securely upon the
instinct which strives for ever closer union, observation of the facts of mental life; and for
and (b ) the instinct of destruction, which that very reason its theoretical superstructure
leads toward the dissolution of what is living. is still incomplete and subject to constant
In psychoanalysis the manifestation of the alteration. Secondly, there is no reason for
force of Eros is given the name "libido. " astonishment that psychoanalysis, which was
originally no more than an attempt at subsequent development of character or
explaining pathological mental phenomena, disease. It is a mistaken belief that sexuality
should have developed into a psychology of coincides with "genitality." The sexual
normal mental life. The justification for this instincts pass through a complicated course of
arose with the discovery that the dreams and development, and it is only at the end of it that
mistakes ("parapraxes, " such as slips of the the "primacy of the genital zone" is attained.
tongue, etc.) of normal men have the same Before this there are a number of "pre-genital
mechanism as neurotic symptoms. organisations" of the libido--points at which it
may become "fixated" and to which, in the
Theoretical Basis. --The first task of event of subsequent repression, it will return
psychoanalysis was the elucidation of nervous ("regression "). The infantile fixations of the
disorders. The analytical theory of the libido are what determine the form of neurosis
neuroses is based upon three ground-pillars: which sets in later. Thus the neuroses are to be
the recognition of (1) "repression, " of (2) the regarded as inhibitions in the development of
importance of the sexual instincts and of (3) the libido.
"transference. "
The Oedipus Complex. --There are no specific
Censorship. --There is a force in the mind causes of nervous disorders; the question
which exercises the functions of a censorship, whether a conflict finds a healthy solution or
and which excludes from consciousness and leads to a neurotic inhibition of function
from any influence upon action all tendencies depends upon quantitative considerations, that
which displease it. Such tendencies are is, upon the relative strength of the forces con-
described as "repressed." They remain cerned. The most important conflict with
unconscious; and if the physician attempts to which a small child is faced is his relation to
bring them into the patient's consciousness he his parents, the "Oedipus complex "; it is in
provokes a "resistance. " These repressed attempting to grapple with this problem that
instinctual impulses, however, are not always persons destined to suffer from a neurosis ha-
made powerless by this process. In many cases bitually fail. The reactions against the
they succeed in making their influence felt by instinctual demands of the Oedipus complex
circuitous paths, and the indirect or are the source of the most precious and
substitutive gratification of repressed impulses socially important achievements of the human
is what constitutes neurotic symptoms. mind; and this probably holds true not only in
the life of individuals but also in the history of
Sexual Instincts. --For cultural reasons the the human species as a whole. The super-ego,
most intensive repression falls upon the sexual the moral factor which dominates the ego, also
instincts; but it is precisely in connection with has its origin in the process of overcoming the
them that repression most easily miscarries, so Oedipus complex.
that neurotic symptoms are found to be
substitutive gratifications of repressed Transference. --By "transference " is meant a
sexuality. The belief that in man sexual life striking peculiarity of neurotics. They develop
begins only at puberty is incorrect. On the toward their physician emotional relations,
contrary, signs of it can be detected from the both of an affectionate and hostile character,
beginning of extra-uterine existence; it reaches which are not based upon the actual situation
a first culminating point at or before the fifth but are derived from their relations toward
year ("early period"), after which it is their parents (the Oedipus complex).
inhibited or interrupted ("latency period") until Transference is a proof of the fact that adults
the age of puberty, which is the second climax have not overcome their former childish
of its development. This double onset of dependence; it coincides with the force which
sexual development seems to be distinctive of has been named "suggestion"; and it is only by
the genus Homo. All experiences during the learning to make use of it that the physician is
first period of childhood are of the greatest enabled to induce the patient to overcome his
importance to the individual, and in internal resistances and do away with his
combination with his inherited sexual repressions. Thus psychoanalytic treatment
constitution, form the dispositions for the
acts as a second education of the adult, as a choanalysis. In spite of this widespread
corrective to his education as a child. opposition, however, the movement in favour
of psychoanalysis was not to be checked. Its
Within this narrow compass it has not been adherents formed themselves into an
possible to mention many matters of the International Association, which passed
greatest interest, such as the "sublimation " of successfully through the ordeal of the World
instincts, the part played by symbolism, the War, and at the present time comprises local
problem of "ambivalence, " etc. Nor has there groups in Vienna, Berlin, Budapest, London,
been space to allude to the applications of Switzerland, Holland, Moscow and Calcutta,
psychoanalysis, which originated, as we have as well as two in the United States. There are
seen, in the sphere of medicine, to other three journals representing the views of these
departments of knowledge (such as societies: the Internationale Zeitschrift für
Anthropology, the Study of Religion, Literary Psychoanalyse, Imago (which is concerned
History and Education) where its influence is with the application of psychoanalysis to non-
constantly increasing. It is enough to say that medical fields of knowledge), and the
psychoanalysis, in its character of the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis.
psychology of the deepest, unconscious
mental acts, promises to become the link During the years 1911-3 two former
between Psychiatry and all of these other adherents, Alfred Adler, of Vienna, and C.G.
fields of study. Jung, of Zürich, seceded from the
psychoanalytic movement and founded
The Psychoanalytic Movement. --The schools of thought of their own. In 1921 Dr.
beginnings of psychoanalysis may be marked M. Eitingon founded in Berlin the first public
by two dates: 1895, which saw the publication psychoanalytic clinic and training-school, and
of Breuer and Freud's Studien über Hysterie, this was soon followed by a second in Vienna.
and 1900, which saw that of Freud's For the moment these are the only institutions
Traumdeutung. At first the new discoveries on the continent of Europe which make
aroused no interest either in the medical psychoanalytic treatment accessible to the
profession or among the general public. In wage-earning classes.
1907 the Swiss psychiatrists, under the
leadership of E. Bleuler and C.G. Jung, began Bibliography
to concern themselves in the subject; and in Breuer and Freud, Studien über Hysterie
1908 there took place at Salzburg a first (1895); Freud, Traumdeutung (1900); Zur
meeting of adherents from a number of Psychopathologie des Alltagslebens (1904);
different countries. In 1909 Freud and Jung Drei Abhandlungen zur Sexualtheorie (1905);
were invited to America by G. Stanley Hall to Vorlesungen zur Einführung in die Psycho-
deliver a series of lectures on psychoanalysis analyse (1916). Freud's complete works have
at Clark University, Worcester, Mass. From been published in Spanish (Obras completas )
that time forward interest in Europe grew (1924), and German (Gesammelte Schriften )
rapidly; it showed itself, however, in a forcible (1925); the greater part of them has been
rejection of the new teachings, characterised translated into English and other languages.
by an emotional colouring which sometimes Short accounts of the subject-matter and
bordered upon the unscientific. history of psychoanalysis will be found in:
Freud, Ueber Psychoanalyse (the lectures
The reasons for this hostility are to be found, delivered at Worcester, U.S.A.) (1909); Zur
from the medical point of view, in the fact that Geschichte der psychoanalytischen Bewegung
psychoanalysis lays stress upon psychical (1914); Selbstdarstellung (in Grote's collec-
factors, and from the philosophical point of tion Die Medizin der Gegenwart ) (1925).
view, in its assuming as an underlying Particularly accessible to English readers are:
postulate the concept of unconscious mental A.A. Brill, Psycho-Analysis (1922); Ernest
activity; but the strongest reason was Jones, Papers on Psycho-Analysis (1923).
undoubtedly the general disinclination of
mankind to concede to the factor of sexuality (S. Fr.)
such importance as is assigned to it by psy-