Abstracts from other Journals

[We are aiming to reprint abstracts of articles from other Journals which might interest psychotherapists, who may not see these Journals. So far we have an arrangement with The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, The International Review of Pscyho-Analysis, The Journal of Analytical Psychology, and The British Journal of Medical Psychology. If this proves popular we may be able to extend it to other Journals. - Ed.]

 1. British Journal of Medical Psychology, Volume  59, Part 1, March 1986

Roberto Mester

Focal dynamic psychotherapy with acute manic patients has been a neglected treatment modality. In young adults with sound premorbid personalities and well-developed ambition systems, focal dynamic psychotherapy is useful in the manic stage; it shortens the process of elaboration of major conflicts related to self-image and self-ideal. Three young Israeli soldiers' case material is discussed in whom, due to different growth constellations, the hope to serve in the army in specific capacities had been a central motivating and consolidating factor in their personality development. Their confrontation with the realities and frustrations of military life caused them to react with a manic syndrome which brought them to treatment. Therapeutic insight led to the reshaping of their ambition to a more adaptive level.

 2. British Journal of Medical Psychology, Volume  59, Part 1, March 1986

Oedipal Determinants in Differential Outcome of Bereavement

Harwant S. Gill

According to psychoanalytic theory, a bereaved individual's prior relationship with the lost person affects his vulnerability to bereavement. Freud attributed the vulnerability to the intensity of ambivalence, and Fenichel saw Oedipal rivalry as one example of that ambivalence. It is argued that, after the death of a parent, reality testing, crucial to the resolution of the Oedipus complex, is disrupted differently for children of the same sex, from those of the opposite %ex. Based on Freud's an