You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
In psychoanalysis, as in any branch of science, technical precepts should be reviewed and reassessed from time to time. In making any such reassessment it is important to follow the general principle that technical precepts should be understood and evaluated in the light of the theory of technique. It is only in that way that a valid decision can be made as to whether and how to apply them in clinical work with patients. This view corresponds to Freud's own opinion, which was that the recommendations and rules of analytic technique must be appraised in terms of what it is that analysis is trying to accomplish; that is, in terms of a theory of therapy. As the goals of analysis as a form of therapy have changed over the years, the means suitable to the attainment of those goals have changed to some extent as well. With the growth of our knowledge of the development and the dynamics of the human
mind, with the deepening of our appreciation of the role of conflict in mental functioning, both normal and abnormal, there have come revisions and extensions in our theory of technique as well which necessitate re-evaluation of some familiar clinical precepts and practices. The precepts chosen for discussion in the present paper are only a sample; much more important is the realization that technical precepts must be firmly based on theory, just as theories must be continually tested against the data available; particularly against those data which are available through the application of the psychoanalytic method—that is, through our clinical work with patients.