Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis: Attachment, Separation, and the Undifferentiated Unintegrated Mind

— —

Michael Robbins (Boston Psychoanalytic Society, Massachusetts, USA)

Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis

Attachment, Separation, and the Undifferentiated Unintegrated Mind

Michael Robbins (Boston Psychoanalytic Society, Massachusetts, USA)

$77.99

Paperback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We then advise you accordingly. If the time taken to get any book is too long for you, you can let us know and we will cancel or adjust your order, and refund as required.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

Routledge
15 April 2019

Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis proposes a major revision of the psychoanalytic theory of the most severe mental illnesses including schizophrenia. Freud believed that psychosis is the consequence of a biologically determined inability to attain and sustain a normal or neurotic mental organization. Michael Robbins proposes instead that psychosis is the outcome of a different developmental pathway. Conscious mind functions in two qualitatively different ways, primordial conscious mentation and reflective representational thought, and psychosis is the result of persistence of a primordial mental process, which is adaptive in infancy, in later situations in which it is neither appropriate nor adaptive.

In Part I Robbins describes how the medical model of psychosis underlies the current approach of both psychiatry and psychoanalysis, despite the fact that neuroscience has failed to confirm the model’s basic organic assumption. In Part II Robbins examines two of Freud’s models of psychosis that are based on the assumption of a constitutional inability to develop a normal or neurotic mind. The theories of succeeding generations of analysts have for the most part reiterated the biases of Freud’s two models, so that psychoanalysis considers the psychoses beyond its scope. In Part III Robbins proposes that the psychoses are the result of disturbances in the attachment-separation phase of development, leading to maladaptive persistence of a primordial form of mental activity related to Freud’s primary process. Finally, in Part IV Robbins describes a psychoanalytic approach to treatment based on his model. The book is richly illustrated with material from Robbins’ clinical practice.

Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis has the potential to undo centuries of alienation between society and psychotic persons. The book offers an understanding of severe mental illness that will be novel and inspiring not only to psychoanalysts but to all mental health professionals.

By: Michael Robbins (Boston Psychoanalytic Society Massachusetts USA)
Imprint: Routledge
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 234mm, Width: 156mm,
Weight: 380g
ISBN: 9780367191177
ISBN 10: 0367191172
Pages: 196
Publication Date: 15 April 2019
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , Further / Higher Education , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Michael Robbins is former Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, USA. He is a member of the American and International Psychoanalytic Associations. His previous books include Experiences of Schizophrenia (1993), Conceiving of Personality (1996), The Primordial Mind in Health and Illness: A Cross-Cultural Perspective (2011), and Consciousness, Language and Self: A Psychoanalytic, Linguistic and Anthropological Exploration of the Dual Nature of Mind (2018).

Reviews for Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis: Attachment, Separation, and the Undifferentiated Unintegrated Mind

Robbins' goal is to introduce psychoanalysis to psychosis in a way that is internal to psychoanalysis and at the same time independent of the neurosis model and the biases that attend it. He does so successfully in this carefully reasoned and clinically illustrated book, as he returns us to a theory of primitive mind and primary process that Freud himself intimated but never further developed. In so doing, Robbins joins the increasingly interesting minority of analysts who are trying to extend psychoanalytic theory to include the understanding and treatment of psychoses. For Robbins, psychosis is the consequence of a developmental pathway separate and independent from that of neurosis. It begins with problems of attachment and separation that produce early failures to separate self from object and integrate a cohesive sense of self. These failures leave one incapable of experiencing, sustaining and resolving intrapsychic conflict and lead to inappropriate and maladaptive persistence of primordial conscious mentation in contexts where reflective representational thought would be appropriate and adaptive. -Howard B. Levine, MD, Editor-in-Chief, The Routledge Wilfred R. Bion Studies Book Series