Research in Horney's Psychoanalytic Theory

Psychoanalytic metatheory is in disarray, and few but the most ardent supporters of orthodox theory disagree that a grave crisis of confidence exists in the psychoanalytic enterprise. As Robert Holt stated in his recent invitational address to the Division of Psychoanalysis of the American Psychological Association:

At present, I think it fair to say the [orthodox] metapsychology is virtually dead…. To be sure, most practicing analysts have not paid much attention to the demise, never having put much stock in that “abstract stuff’ anyway. What they do not realize is that they are far more committed to it than they know. For everyday items like ego, id, instinct, and psychodynamics are integral parts of the metapsychology rather than the clinical theory.

Central to this demise are the detailed evaluations of metatheory by Applegarth (1971), Eagle (1984), Gill (1976), Holt (1981), Holtzman (1985), Klein (1976), Leites (1971), Schafer (1976), and Yankelovich and Barrett (1970), to name a few. The “collective critique” is summarized, in part, by Holt (1985) in the following conclusions: The relationship between metapsychology and clinical theory is vague and fuzzy; concepts are poorly defined, overlapping, and often reified. The metapsychology itself contains many self-contradictions, logical errors, and unscientific figural language. The theory is derived from outdated conceptions of physiology, anatomy, and evolution. Finally, the theory is closed, circular, and allows derivation of no new propositions (Rubinstein, 1967). The growing realization of the bankruptcy of metapsychology has led a number of distinguished psychoanalysts to abandon the metatheory entirely and instead to focus on psychoanalytic clinical theory (Klein, 1976; Schafer 1976). Lugubriously, when the clinical theory is subjected to rigorous examination uncontaminated by metapsychological paraphrase, many of the working propositions of psychoanalysts appear commonsensical or even ban