The History of Freud's Concepts of Regression

While Freud borrowed directly from Jackson in developing his idea of temporal regression, by the 1890s various versions of the notion of retrograde development were scattered hither and yon in the works of a variety of authors, particularly biologists and psychologists. Again, by the late nineteenth century, a number of writers were employing ideas akin to topographical regression. While Freud borrowed directly from Breuer in developing this notion, theories involving a concept of centrifugal flow of stimulation in the nervous system constituted a well-established category of explanations of hallucinations.

As can be seen from both the historical backgrounds and Freud's writings, there is much to support the conclusion that we have here two distinct concepts. Temporal regression is firmly rooted in a heritage of developmental schemes of one sort or another, and, during much of the nineteenth century, ideas akin to it kept appearing, particularly in efforts to explain pathological phenomena. While Spencer's views make it clear that this type of notion can readily become part of highly abstract systems of thought, such ideas tended more to occur in explanatory efforts brought to bear on significant collections of actual data. Concepts