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EARLY CLASSICAL psychoanalytic references to bodily reactions associated with psychic disturbances emphasized the role of libido in cathecting body parts and were made in connection with such conditions as conversion hysteria and hypochondriasis. Later when Freud (6) introduced the structural concept of the mental apparatus, he pointed out that the body, particularly its surface, was the source of sensations from which the ego is derived. Schilder (20) elaborated on this by postulating the existence of a body image; i.e., the body and its organs are represented intrapsychically by means of a sum of memories of body sensations and their interrelations. The body image was shown to be not necessarily identical with the objective body. These two concepts became additional influences in the continuing study of the relationship of bodily reactions to psychic functions as this study was extended to the so-called psychosomatic disorders and organ neuroses. While during this time the related subject of ego functioning also became a focus of attention, it was not until recently that its connection with bodily processes began to be investigated.
In 1939 Felix Deutsch (1) pointed out that the ego utilizes sense perceptions to prevent or deny a loss by their symbolic representation of the object. Subsequently Hartmann, Kris, and Loewenstein (11) suggested that since the ego as a functioning organization controls motility, there is a particularly close tie between ego, aggression, and the skeletal musculature. Shortly thereafter, Deutsch (2) referred to the executive and integrative functions of the ego in determining postural configurations which he