Some Psychoanalytic Applications of the Psychological Field Concept

For a number of years I have been interested in reëxamining psychoanalytic knowledge from the point of view of the integrating task of the ego. There have been three main phases in the development of psychoanalytic thought. At first, interest was centered chiefly upon the id, upon the repressed forces. The repressing forces at this time were for the most part merely annoying obstacles in the way of investigation of the repressed unconscious. Then came a phase of interest in the superego, in the repressing forces. At present we are entering a phase of interest in the functions of the ego.

I regard it as a symptom that we are not yet fully out of the superego phase, that much of the present psychoanalytic interest in the ego still centers about the mechanisms of defense, and about the struggles of the ego to defend itself against excessive demands of the id. As I have pointed out elsewhere (10) the defensive function of the ego is comparable to the activities of a government when its very existence is threatened by a revolution. Under these circumstances its normal peacetime function is apt to be very much disturbed, perhaps even thrown badly out of gear. Study of the normal functioning of the ego must be a study of its synthetic integrative activity.

The chief difficulty in the way of studying the integrative functioning of the ego is the fact that it is so unobtrusive (12). When a machine is operating smoothly we are not aware of its mechanisms. Only when something gets out of order are we reminded that its normal smooth working is something that needs to be analyzed and understood.