Clinical psychoanalysis has led to the development of four conceptually separable perspectives on the functioning of the human mind. These are referred to herein as the psychologies of drive, ego, object relations, and self. Their clinical relevance is explored by applying them to issues regarding evenly hovering attention and the mutative factors in psychoanalysis. Those two areas, in turn, are seen to undergo an expansion when viewed from the perspective of each of the four psychologies.
Mahler's developmental theories are reviewed in the light of subsequent clinical experience and theoretical and empirical critique. Several modifications are proposed, each tending to particularize and focus the nature and scope of developmental events. Particular attention is accorded the "symbiosis" concept, and focus placed on transmission of psychodynamic issues from mother to infant and on the progressive buildup of self-sustaining pathological systems. Overall, an argument is advanced for the continued developmental import of Mahler's "symbiotic" and "separation-individuation" phase formulations, though with recognition of significant individual differences in their role in individual lives. An argument is advanced also for the clinical utility of these ideas, and illustrations presented, though the link between clinical applications and psychoanalytic theories of early development remains problematic.
In this work, Fred Pine devotes himself to an exploration of psychoanalytic technique and does so with great distinction. Mirabile dictu, the book lives up to the lavish praise from distinguished colleagues, in this case, Warren Poland and Judith Chused, on the back of the dust jacket. Poland writes, "The wisdom in this respectful overview of diversity in technique is based on broad clinical experience, serious study, and personal modesty-all expressed with a lucidity rare in professional writing," and Chused tells us that he recognizes that what may be useful with a patient at one moment may not be indicated at another; that not only do patients differ from one another, but their capacity to understand and utilize the analyst's interventions differ from one moment to another.In writing an excellent treatise on technique, Pine is open-minded about the question of the model or models of the mind that underlie technique.For a decade, Pine has been writing of four psychologies, namely, models of the mind organized around drives, ego functioning, object relationships, and the self. He believes that these are separate psychologies that cannot be integrated on a theoretical level but feels that on the clinical level they are additive and complement one another. Although he acknowledges that some hold to a single model of psychology rather than multiple psychologies, he refers to this alternative in pejorative terms, for example, he finds "no difference in arriving at a particular intervention when working with a 'four psychologies model' " (p. 154) or within a seemingly
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