psychoanalysis

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what are your thoughts on it? it's always been an area of vague interest to me. although not, perhaps, from a particularly psychoanalytical point of view, if that makes sense. for instance, as an art student, i found things like freud's civilisation and it's discontents and the mystic writing pad hugely interesting, and have a big interest in art brut although this doesn't necessarily relate to psychoanalysis per se, but there is a loose connection through the interest in it by the art psychotherapy movement etc.

but after coming across this book, i'm really interested to pick a copy up:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Psychotherapy-R ... 380&sr=1-9

as i'm generally of the belief that problems in individuals stem from their surroundings, and, working in the area of mental health, i find the predominance of psychiatry and the idea of medicalisation of human behaviours pretty fundamentally flawed, i wonder, is psychotherapy really nothing more than a means of individualising social maladies?

here is the blurb from amazon, it may be of interest to some of you, and i'd welcome any comments as i'm obviously a person with a passing interest in this stuff but who is far from an expert in any way, as noted above...

It is empirically un-falsifiable nonsense.

ruveyn

psychotherapy was debunked decades ago.

Freud loved sniffing coke. That should tell you a lot about his ideas.

I'm interested in this but a little short of time right now. A few thoughts that occur to me in reading your post:

I think psychoanalysis is an extremely interesting area and Freud a great mind to, arguably, invent it. I think there are psychotherapy cults although I'm not sure what they are and there are many different schools of thought with subtle differences stemming from Freud, each with their own figurehead thinkers.

What I really want to say, is that, for me, I have to be able to question and go beyond what a particular theorist might say about my own particular psychology (although reading some of the psychoanalytic literature it also struck me how well some of these people know me - they know me better than I know myself because they devoted their lives to studying the human psyche, and despite my uniquness, I am, still, largely 'just' another human psyche). I want to work it out for myself (although I largely see myself through the ideas of experts, such as Freud).

Argh! Frustration in articulation again, and I'm out of time, for now ...

^^^ I think the point was that Freud preached "talk therapy" as the solution to problems, but used psychostimulant medication to solve his own.

Freud was a pioneer. He practically invented the discipline of psychology. I give him mad props for that.

But one person being an innovator doesn't mean his ideas are the be-all and end-all of the practice. Psychoanalysis was ground-breaking for its time, but it also cleared the way for the development of newer, better theories and breaking new ground. It's kinda like Galileo pushing what was then the Copernican hypothesis. Galileo laid the foundation for a more accurate explanation for the motions of the planets. But he also described planetary orbits as circular and also believed that the sun was the cause of tides--this latter idea already known to be wrong then as much as it is now, and to make matters worse part of Galilean theory hinged on evidence of solar effects on tides to make it work. But he also pioneered the use of the telescope and opened up a whole new realm of study. What little bit he was right about counted.

I see Freud the same way. We are long past psychoanalysis now. It's time spent studying Freud's work, figuring out what WORKS and what DOESN'T, adjusting, and moving on that really matters. I mean, come on... This is the guy who figured out the reason for most male sexual dysfunction back then was a poor childhood relationship with your mother. Frikkin' BRILLIANT!! !

It strikes me as uncritical to claim the psychoanalysis has been debunked. Ruveyn appears to me to be closer to the mark. Psycholanalytic theory was largely clinical and anecdotal, and its development was inconsistent with the kind of empirical study that has dominated the medical approach to psychotherapy.

But that does not make it wrong.

Psychiatry is founded in a far greater degree of scientific experiementation, to be sure. But are we so happy with the results of that work? How much money is poured away on unnecessary prescriptions for antidepressants and and anti-anxiety drugs?

I am quite happy to see a patient explore alternative approaches to treatment, provided that those treatments do not cause further harm and do not leave untreated a condition for which medical intervention is indicated. If nothing else, the placebo effect is real, and if a patient sees value in a course of therapy, who am I to gainsay that decision, absent a compelling case?

I respect Freuds work in that I am a great believer in learnt behaviour. I think his overall claims are valid and that a persons surroundings and experiences in life will shape them. However, I think it is recognised now that we all have our in built traits that can effect our way through life, but this does not overthrow what Freud said. Adults are often at the mercy of what they learnt during the formative years and the process of pshycoanalysis is available to tackle deep rooted issues. But I would not go for it, simply because I think it would be impossible or extremely stressful to "un learn" something that you learnt during childhood. Who really wants to have their most deep entrenched memories brought to the surface? What good would it do unless they are causing severe mental problems later in life?

I think for pshycotherapy to work well, you would need a combination of drugs and relaxed sessions to deal with things like PTSD or any childhood trauma. MDMA works well at this, and apparently LSD has been tested for it too.

I also like what Freud said about Religion and Civilisation.