Affect, Object, and Character Structure

Description

Affects, object representations, and character structures are three central concerns for contemporary psychoanalytic treatment. Originally published in 1995, the much neglected difficulties with positive affects and affective attitudes such as joy, exhilaration, courage and competency are explored in this volume through extensive case material. A treatment model emphasizing a reversal of the... Read more

Affects, object representations, and character structures are three central concerns for contemporary psychoanalytic treatment.

Originally published in 1995, the much neglected difficulties with positive affects and affective attitudes such as joy, exhilaration, courage and competency are explored in this volume through extensive case material. A treatment model emphasizing a reversal of the traditional figure-ground is carefully delineated; positive affects, for so long held in the background, are brought into the foreground and become the central focal points for the psychotherapy process. Oedipal implications of this reversal in figure-ground are comprehensively delineated.

The object relational implications of this reversal of perspective are explored in the volume via an intensive focus upon the protectiveness reactions via which earlier objects are repetitively shielded from angry critical reactions and negative judgments. The incapacity to mourn and, ultimately, let go of pathological introjects and identifications is linked to an unconscious need to protect early objects against unfavorable perceptions and associated affective reactions. A failure to attain maturational momentum from a more adequate process of mourning, object relational integration and psychic healing results from these pathological protectiveness reactions.

Common forms of character pathology and resistances can be viewed as resulting from an excessive need to protect early pathological objects. The extreme stuckness and repetitively unsatisfying behavior patterns of many characterologically disturbed patients can be alleviated via an intensive form of resistance analysis focusing upon the reluctance to experience positive affects and the inner object relational paradigms associated with that reluctance. The paradoxically beloved toxic objects and nostalgic attachments unconsciously underlying many forms of character disorder need to be repeatedly focused upon, in the treatment model explicated in the volume.

Read less

Acknowledgments. Introduction. Part I: Affect 1. The Centrality of Affects in Contemporary Psychoanalysis 2. Clinging to Negative Affects 3. Dread of “Exhilarated” Affects in the Phobic Patient 4. Difficulties with Competent, Potent Affects 5. Positive Affect and Oedipal Conflict 6. Courageous Attitudes and the Therapeutic Process Part II: Object 7. The Therapeutic Use of Self and Object Representations 8. The Need to Protect the Object 9. The Wish to Stop Therapy: Object Relational Implications 10. Object Relations in the Negative Oedipal Conflict Part III: Character Structure 11. The Reluctance to Experience Positive Affects: A Characterological Form of Resistance 12. Beloved Symptoms and Stasis in Character Disorder 13. Characterological Depression in Primitively Organized Patients 14. Meshing Character Structures in Couples. Conclusion. References. Name Index. Subject Index.

Author(s)

Biography

Morton Kissen

Critics' Reviews

Reviews for the original edition:

“This book is one of the most important contributions to the understanding of contemporary psycho-analytic theory and its development, and treatment technique. It views affects and object relations within the context of character structure, and emphasizes their importance, especially the intolerance of positive affects, in the therapeutic interaction.

Dr Kissen is a master at synthesizing the works of modern clinicians and establishing a continuum with classical foundations. This is a scholarly encyclopedic volume as well as a clinically relevant treatise that should be read by every serious clinician. The author in addition to exposing the reader to the breadth of the filed, also introduces us to his creative formulations that are supported by ample clinical material. In spite of its profundity, this book is lucid and has an elegant simplicity that makes it a delight to read.” – Peter L. Giovacchini, M.D.

“The role of positive affects in various types of neurotic symptomatology and character disorders has been neglected in the psychoanalytic literature. Dr Kissen discusses the variety of positive affects which are avoided or only reluctantly experienced in many clinical conditions.

Viewed from an object relations as well as an intersubjective theoretical position, the rich clinical material presented here provides an original and clinically useful approach which will be extremely useful to psychoanalysts and other mental health professionals.” – Eleanor Galenson, M.D.

Affect, Object, and Character Structure

Description

Table of Contents

Author(s)

Biography

Critics' Reviews

SOCIAL NETWORKS

Secure Shopping Payment Options