Although both hysterics and obsessional neurotics have certain symptoms in common, they show a different attitude to them which mainly rests upon a different reaction to the anxiety underlying them. The obsessional reacts with an ego which has become unified into a single mental institution. The ego of the hysteric, on the other hand, is still mainly a body ego and has remained weak and divided. In consequence, that part of it which is in contact with the anxiety state is often itself repressed, so that the conscious ego becomes greatly restricted. (Incidentally, these repressed states of the ego, together with their positive and negative attitudes to their objects may, the author thinks, correspond to the 'introjected objects' of the English school.)

In comparing certain characteristics of hysterics and obsessionals which seem to be similar but are not so in fact, Federn points out, for