Self psychology

Kohut came to psychoanalysis by way of neurology and psychiatry in the 1940s, and then 'embraced analysis with the fervor of a convert ... [and as] "Mr Psychoanalysis" ' took on an idealizing image of Freud and his theories. Subsequently, "in a burst of creativity that began in the mid-1960s ... Kohut found his voice and explored narcissism in new ways that led to what he ended up calling a 'psychology of the self'". == Major concepts ==

Self Kohut explained, in 1977, that in all he wrote on the psychology of the self, he purposely did not define the self. He explained his reasoning this way: "The self...is, like all reality...not knowable in its essence...We can describe the various cohesive forms in which the self appears, can demonstrate the several constituents that make up the self ... and explain their genesis and functions. We can do all that but we will still not know the essence of the self as differentiated from its manifestations. Empathy Kohut maintained that parents' failures to empathize with their children and the responses of their children to these failures were 'at the root of almost all psychopathology'. For Kohut, the loss of the other and the other's self-object ("selfobject") function (see below) leaves the individual apathetic, lethargic, empty of the feeling of life, and without vitality – in short, depressed. The infant moving from grandiose to cohesive self and beyond must go through the slow process of disillusionment with phantasies of omnipotence, mediated by the parents: 'This process of gradual and titrated disenchantment requires that the infant's caretakers be empathetically attuned to the infant's needs'. Correspondingly, to help a patient deal in therapy with earlier failures in the disenchantment process, Kohut the therapist 'highlights empathy as the tool par excellence, which allows the creation of a relationship between patient and analyst that can offer some hope of mitigating early self pathology'. The conceptual introduction of empathy was not intended to be a "discovery." Empathic moments in psychology existed long before Kohut. Instead, Kohut posited that empathy in psychology should be acknowledged as a powerful therapeutic tool, extending beyond "hunches" and vague "assumptions," and enabling empathy to be described, taught, and used more actively. Selfobjects Selfobjects are external objects that function as part of the "self machinery" – 'i.e., objects which are not experienced as separate and independent from the self'. as transitional objects. Among 'the great variety of selfobject relations that support the cohesion, vigor, and harmony of the adult self ... [are] cultural selfobjects (the writers, artists, and political leaders of the group – the nation, for example – to which a person feels he belongs)'. Lacan highlighted 'the mirror stage ... of a normal transitivism. The child who strikes another says that he has been struck; the child who sees another fall, cries.' In 1960, 'Arlow observed, "The existence of another individual who is a reflection of the self brings the experience of twinship in line with the psychology of the double, of the mirror image and of the double".' Kohut pointed out that 'fantasies, referring to a relationship with such an alter ego or twin (or conscious wishes for such a relationship) are frequently encountered in the analysis of narcissistic personalities', and termed their transference activation 'the alter-ego transference or the twinship'. • "grandiose-exhibitionistic needs" • "the need for an omnipotent idealized figure" • "alter-ego needs" Kohut argued that 'reactivation of the grandiose self in analysis occurs in three forms: these relate to specific stages of development ... (1) The archaic merger through the extension of the grandiose self; (2) a less archaic form which will be called alter-ego transference or twinship; and (3) a still less archaic form ... mirror transference. Alternately, self psychologists 'divide the selfobject transference into three groups: (1) those in which the damaged pole of ambitions attempts to elicit the confirming-approving response of the selfobject (mirror transference); (2) those in which the damaged pole of ideals searches for a selfobject that will accept its idealisation (idealising transference); and those in which the damaged intermediate area of talents and skills seeks ... alter ego transference.' The tripolar self forms as a result of the needs of an individual binding with the interactions of other significant persons within the life of that individual. == Cultural implications ==

An interesting application of self psychology has been in the interpretation of the friendship of Freud and Jung, its breakdown, and its aftermath. It has been suggested that at the height of the relationship 'Freud was in narcissistic transference, that he saw in Jung an idealised version of himself', and that conversely in Jung there was a double mix of 'idealization of Freud and grandiosity in the self'. During Jung's midlife crisis, after his break with Freud, arguably 'the focus of the critical years had to be a struggle with narcissism: the loss of an idealized other, grandiosity in the sphere of the self, and resulting periods of narcissistic rage'. Only as he worked through to 'a new sense of himself as a person separate from Freud' could Jung emerge as an independent theorist in his own right. On the assumption that 'the western self is embedded in a culture of narcissism ... implicated in the shift towards postmodernity', opportunities for making such applications will probably not decrease in the foreseeable future. == Criticism ==

Kohut, who was 'the center of a fervid cult in Chicago', aroused at times almost equally fervent criticism and opposition, emanating from at least three other directions: drive theory, Lacanian psychoanalysis, and object relations theory. From the perspective of drive theory, Kohut appears 'as an important contributor to analytic technique and as a misguided theoretician ... introduces assumptions that simply clutter up basic theory. The more postulates you make, the less their explanatory power becomes.' The danger in 'the concept of the sympathetic or empathic analyst who is led astray towards an ideal of devotion and samaritan helping ... [ignoring] its sadistic underpinnings' At the same time, 'any attempt at "being the better parent" has the effect of deflecting, even seducing, a patient from using the analyst or therapist in a negative transference ... the empathic analyst, or "better" parent'. With the passage of time, and the eclipse of grand narrative, it may now be possible to see the several strands of psychoanalytic theory less as fierce rivals and more 'as complementary partners. Drive psychology, ego psychology, object relations psychology and self psychology each have important insights to offer twenty-first-century clinicians.' == See also ==