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About Us
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MODERN
PSYCHOANALYSIS rests upon the theoretical framework and clinical
approach of Sigmund Freud, who defined clinical psychoanalysis as any
line of investigation that takes transference and resistance as the
starting point of its work. As psychoanalytic practice and theory
developed, psychoanalysts began to doubt the applicability of classical
psychoanalytic technique to the treatment of narcissistic disorders.
Interpretation, the mainstay of classical technique, proved ineffective
in the treatment of severe pathologies.
In the mid forties, Hyman Spotnitz—working as a supervisor with a group
of mental health professionals at the Jewish Board of
Guardians—developed a systematic theory of technique designed for the
treatment of preverbal conditions. The body of theoretical and clinical
knowledge developed by Spotnitz and his colleagues, known as “Modern
Psychoanalysis,” amplified Freud’s theories making them applicable to
the full spectrum of emotional disorders.
Spotnitz determined that the core problem in narcissism is self-hate
rather than self-love, as previously thought. He recognized the
preponderance of destructive aggression in narcissistic disorders and
used it dynamically in formulating his theory of the technique, thus
also confirming the operational viability of Freud’s theory of dual
drives. Spotnitz further recognized that transference phenomena include
experiences from conception through the first two years of life, in
addition to those from the oedipal period.
The arousal in the patient of pre-feeling and/or early feeling states,
communicated in the analysis primarily through behavior, symptoms, and
symbolic communications, rather than through words, was termed the
narcissistic transference. The feelings induced in the analyst by the
preverbal patient’s dynamics were recognized as the narcissistic
countertransference, and became an invaluable tool for understanding
unspoken communication and formulating interventions which proved
successful in resolving “the stone wall of narcissism.” The analyst’s
interventions are primarily intended to provide an
emotional-maturational communication to the patient, rather than to
promote intellectual insight.
Candidates in modern psychoanalytic institutes are trained to
understand and work with narcissistic as well as other conditions. They
learn how to develop the narcissistic transference and to use the
patient’s verbal and non-verbal communications, along with their
induced feelings, in resolving resistances. By using techniques
appropriate to resolve the gamut of resistances to maturation, Modern
Psychoanalysts are able to reach patients with neurotic, somatic,
borderline and psychotic dysfunctions.