Prologue

This Issue of Psychoanalytic Inquiry concerns itself with the vicissitudes of motility and expressive behavior during exploratory psychotherapy. Psychoanalysts may see this as a strange topic, one that, if applied in treatment, might produce acting out or, worse, permit the patient to regress deeply. Yet almost all psychoanalytically oriented therapists have dealt with patients who wish to sit up, rather than using the couch. Amusing vignettes abound about the patient who, for cherished resistances' sake, leaves one foot on the floor, ready for flight, while supine on the couch. To better facilitate recovery from such incidents, analysts might find it useful to give the subject of motility their attention.

Another group of therapists—those whose therapeutic methods are shaped by the arts—have found that using motility as another investigative medium permits more complete understanding of patients.