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.
Scientific Sessions:
Several interesting panels and papers were presented at the Midwinter Meetings of the American Psychoanalytic Association held in New York City from December 6-9, 1951. In accordance with our usual procedure we present abstracts of the papers and reports of the panels, the latter prepared by the secretaries of the individual panels.
Panel: George Gero, M.D., Chairman
Charles Brenner, M.D., Secretary
This panel consisted of the following presentations:
Phobic Symptom Formation and Dream Interpretation, by Dr. Bertram D. Lewin.
Masturbation and Symptom Formation, by Dr. Jacob A. Arlow.
Defenses in Symptom Formation, by Drs. Charles Brenner and George Gero.
In his introductory remarks Dr. Gero mentioned the importance of the role of the study of neurotic symptoms in the development of psychoanalysis, and posed the question whether our therapeutic efforts might not be directed in a constructive way by means of a better understanding of symptom formation based on the growing body of clinical experience. He said that, following Freud's example, the present panel would concentrate on the phobias, and that perhaps future panels would choose other categories of symptoms for investigation.
The first paper, by Dr. B. D. Lewin, was entitled “Phobic Symptom Formation and Dream Interpretation.” Dr. Lewin said that Freud has given us two types of formulation in regard to phobic symptoms. In The Problem of Anxiety he elucidated the dynamics and the role of anxiety as a signal, its relation to repression, defense, and symptom formation in general. Earlier he compared the manifest façade of phobias to the manifest content of dreams, mentioning comparable distortions,