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.
Freud has warned us against using the psychoanalysis of a scientific adversary for polemic purposes. Nevertheless, it is interesting to investigate the psychological backgrounds of certain scientific antipathies or preferences. Brierley is of the opinion that emotional tendencies are chiefly operative in authors who doubt the theory of the 'internalized objects' (or some specific subdivisions of this theory). Since she is of the opinion that the reception of a hypothesis has 'quite a lot in common with the reception of interpretations', she tries to find the unconscious reasons for the criticism of 'internalized objects'. Persons who usually use projection rather than introjection as a means of defense have more difficulties in understanding this theory, she thinks, than 'introjectors'. Some authors react to the theory of internalization with anxiety because its acceptance would endanger their narcissistic unity. Others have become estranged from the archaic ways of thinking and living. Finally the author thinks that the criticism may be connected with anal repressions. 'One comes across a distaste for the "solid" nature of internal object terminology and a preference for thinking in the more "fluid" concepts of instinctual energy and affects that suggest painful anal reverberations.'
Brierley's paper does not discuss the correctness or incorrectness of the hypothesis in question.