Meeting of the Psychoanalytic Association of New York

May 17, 1971. THE DEHUMANIZATION OF PSYCHOANALYSIS (Annual Freud Lecture). Jacob A. Arlow, M.D.

Dr. Arlow stressed the æsthetic qualities of psychoanalysis and its closeness to human experience and conflict. Because of this æsthetic sensitivity, writers and artists have been among the first to appreciate the relevance of psychoanalysis as the most human of all the psychologies. Psychoanalysis is a scientific psychology with a methodology uniquely its own, studying man not as an artificial specimen divorced from past and present but as an individual in the setting of his constant conflict within himself and with the world. In Arlow's opinion, the psychoanalytic situation—namely, the special technical device of psychoanalytic therapy and investigation—was Freud's greatest contribution. It provided a standard method of operation and, therefore, the beginning of a scientific discipline, which takes advantage of the unique human qualities of man and permits understanding of deeper, universal aspects of the human condition. From analytic data based on psychic determinism and dynamics, one can infer such derivative concepts as intrapsychic conflict, the operation of the unconscious, the genetic approach, and the persistence of infantile fantasies. When the analytic process is proceeding favorably, the communication between analyst and analysand takes on the quality of an æsthetic experience. As in art, in analytic therapy communication reaches its most human expression: the transmission of emotion. The patient's productions are given meaning through the creative effort of the analyst's interpretation.

Dr. Arlow divides the interpretive process into two phases: the first is æsthetic and intuitive; the second is cognitive. To validate his intuitive and empathic understanding of the patient, the analyst must turn to the data of the analytic situation: clinical observations which provide the basis for our claim