0.2 Sigmund freud  (Page 28/37)

As mentioned above, Freud came to believe that the use of hypnosis, which had been championed by Breuer and Charcot, was unable to get at the root causes of patient’s neuroses. He also learned through experience that psychoanalysis could only be effective if he was able to go back into the early childhood of his patients and uncover the unconscious conflicts and repressions that led to their neurotic behaviors. In order to accomplish this goal, Freud relied primarily on free association and dream analysis . In the history of psychoanalysis, there have been those who believed that psychoanalysis officially began when Freud rejected hypnosis and introduced free association (Freud, 1914/1995). Free association is often used, of course, during the interpretation of dreams, so the two techniques are not mutually exclusive. With regard to the value of interpreting dreams, Freud wrote perhaps his most famous line: “…the interpretation of dreams is the via regia [royal road] to a knowledge of the unconscious element in our psychic life.” (pg. 508; Freud, 1900/1995).

Free Association – Freud’s Therapeutic Breakthrough

Free association grew out of a need that resulted from problems implementing Breuer’s cathartic method. The first problem was that many patients could not be hypnotized. With the patients that Freud could not hypnotize, especially those who would not even allow him to try hypnotizing them, Freud tried a technique of pressing them to remember. This technique also came up short, and Freud recognized a need to work around the patient’s resistance (which we will examine in more detail below). The first technique that Freud developed involved pressing his hand against his patient’s forehead and asking them to say whatever thought, no matter how seemingly irrelevant, came first into their consciousness (Freud&Breuer, 1895/2004). Freud himself described this technique as a trick, one that disconnects the patient’s attention from his conscious searching and reflecting. However, trick or not, Freud found the technique to be indispensable. The thoughts that came to the forefront of consciousness, those believed to be easily accessible via the preconscious, were likely to be connected to the underlying associations responsible for the neurotic patient’s symptoms. Freud used this technique of free association quite successfully. As early as 1892, he treated a patient known as Fräulein Elisabeth von R. by relying entirely on free association (Freud&Breuer, 1895/2004).

Still, Freud did make some modifications in the technique. Two other methods used to begin the free association were to have the patient think of a number or a name at random. Of course, Freud did not believe that it was possible for anything in the mind to occur at random, and by continuing the association brought up by that first name or number, Freud could help his patient to arrive at the true unconscious associations that were the root of their problems (Freud, 1917/1966). He also used free association during the interpretation of dreams, and often found it helpful to examine which part of the dream the patient chose to begin making free associations (Freud, 1933/1965). Freud also considered psychoanalysis to be effective with children, but cautioned that a child’s lack of psychological development limited their ability for free association. Other psychodynamic theorists worked more extensively with children, however, including Adler, Anna Freud, and Klein.