As the 19th century came to an end, a new
kind of philosopher was dawning for the 20th
century.
He would come up with strange and ground-breaking
theories of the human unconscious.
Bridging the 19th century's experience with
Darwin and hard science, with softer sciences
of Hypnotism and Free Association.
This was the rise of Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalysis.
Sigmund Freud was born in Freiberg in 1856.
Son of Jacob Freud, a wool merchant, and Amalia
Nathansohn.
Amalia was the 3rd wife to Jacob and was half
his age.
This left Freud in the strange position of
having 2 brothers near the same age as his
mother.
They later would become objects of self-analysis
for Freud.
His future work often involved, not just the
unconscious, but experiences of childhood.
Freud did well in school, and was a voracious
reader, and would teach his siblings about
the subjects he read.
When the family moved to Vienna, and Sigmund
grew up, he wasn't able to find a specialty
to put these passions to work.
His interests went in many different directions.
Between law and medicine, Freud eventually
chose medicine, because of his desire to gain
knowledge, and its practical ability to gain
an income.
Freud eventually graduated in medicine in
Vienna in 1881.
He did anatomical research before working
in Meynert’s laboratory where neurological
causes of psychiatric disturbances were being
sought.
With his various mentors throughout his training,
he was taught objectivity and emotional distance
towards facts.
His teachers came from influences of empiricism,
and of Darwin's work of evolution.
Yet Freud found that he was actually drawn
more towards human affairs, than natural objects.
But he would keep his empirical cause and
effect attitude in these humanistic studies.
As Freud struggle to gain expertise in medicine,
he decided to focus on a private medical practice,
to win over his lover's mother, who didn't
see Freud as a good catch for her daughter,
due to his lack of prospects.
His lover was Martha Bernays.
They were often apart when Freud pursued his
career interests, but they wrote to each other
almost daily.
In 1885, Freud received a travelling scholarship,
and he took 6 months off to visit a hero of
his, Jean-Martin Charcot in Paris.
He wanted to learn about hypnotism and how
it was used in dealing with mental disorders.
The hypnotist Pierre Janet was learning there
as well.
Charcot was a psychiatrist and a medical hypnotist.
He showed that hypnosis and suggestion could
help people with their hysteria.
Hysteria was a very common diagnosis at the
end of the 19th century.
It often involved strange paralyses, anaesthesias,
and fits.
Many doctors couldn't find any physical or
neurological damage and couldn't explain the
symptoms.
They often treated it as if the patient was
faking the symptoms, which is called Malingering.
To Charcot, these symptoms were from a conversion
from psychological stress into physical symptoms.
He also felt that sexual problems were a culprit.
Freud heard Charcot say "in this sort of case,
it's always a question of the genitals, always,
always, always."
Freud was indebted to Charcot for the clinical
methods and hints that hysteria was related
to trauma and sexual elements.
He was also inspired by how the mind has layers
of unconscious material not available when
the patient is completely conscious.
This is where Freud decided to focus.
Extending on Charcot's methods of hypnotism
and suggestion, Freud was able to theorize
at what gave patients relief.
This was a beginning of a Catharsis method,
that is still part of Counselling today.
When Freud returned to Vienna, he used his
neurology practice as a place to try hypnosis.
He was also impressed with physiologist Joseph
Breuer, and worked with him on the foundational
Studies in Hysteria.
Studies in Hysteria involves 5 case studies,
and theories on the origin of Hysteria.
As Freud and Breuer continued on their studies,
Freud theorized that what they were learning
included unconscious phenomenon in normal
people.
For example, as patients got better, they
would often respond to Freud with love responses
as if he were a lover, or a family member.
This he called Transference.
The early theory of Freud, at the time, was
that emotions that were not allowed to be
expressed, got "dammed up", and appeared in
physical symptoms instead.
These memories were either out of conscious
awareness, or an abridged story missing pertinent
details.
The cause of Hysteria wasn't always a single
strong trauma.
It could also be a series of smaller traumas.
These traumas were psychic traumas, or frights.
The mind finds something objectionable about
thoughts or traumas, and then doesn't react
emotionally in the correct way, but instead
represses these events in memory.
Often these repressions were to avoid some
social stigma.
For example, anxiety could be over consequences
to an action.
Hypochondria would be the fear of the bodily
effects of anxiety, and then superstitious
treatments, medicines, and rituals to rid
the bodily effects.
Delusions of persecution, which is a fear
of the social effects of releasing what is
repressed.
Shame, which is fear of others knowing about
you.
As Freud worked with these patients, he was
able to come up with 2 general procedures
to apply.
1st, bringing up repressed memories related
to the trauma.
This meant using hypnotism and suggestions
with Freud's hand pressed on the head, or
Free Association, where patients were allowed
to release their unconscious thoughts without
censorship, and the main part of the practice
which is to bring out more and more detail
from the traumatic memories, to expand on
those shortened, abridged memories.
The patient in this case would be in a chair
facing away from a listening Freud.
The 2nd part is letting the patient release
the repressed emotions associated with the
memories.
This release, or Catharsis, or Abreaction,
relieved the patient's of their hysterical
symptoms as well.
By bringing out the cause and effect of the
trauma details that were redacted in conscious
awareness, it gave the patient the opportunity
to bring out the repressed emotion and to
develop understanding of those traumatic events.
His methods moved from hypnotism, into a form
of "talking cure".
As this opened the doors to new avenues for
Freud, many unexpected problems emerged.
Over time Freud and Breuer's patients found
that their cure did not last.
Hysteria ended up being an amalgamation of
many psychological and neurological disorders.
Modern psychology still recognizes this disorder,
but it is now called Conversion Disorder.
Elements of Multiple Sclerosis, and Anxiety
disorders are now separated into their own
sections, as science advanced through the
decades.
Hysteria as a disorder became obsolete.
Another difficulty was related to the type
of trauma that Freud and Breuer's patients
had.
The understanding of external trauma is still
important, as Freud method advanced, but he
still had to see what people were doing internally,
causing their own stress.
One of the problems of focusing on what was
external, was sex abuse.
As much as sexual assault is a real problem,
Freud was becoming aware that providing suggestions
of sexual abuse to could be leading the patient
to conclusions that are untrue.
As ground-breaking as Studies in Hysteria
was, Freud was challenged to develop his understanding
of the unconscious much further.
In the next installment of Psych Reviews,
we'll be looking at those further developments
in understanding dreams.
After that second part, the series will continue
on Freud's later updates on his topography,
and then his massive influence on later psychologists,
which continues to this day.
