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In his pioneer article, speculating on the amenability of errors of refraction to psychoanalytic treatment, Smith Ely Jelliffe opened up a fruitful area of study within the field of psychoanalysis.7 Around 1930, I came to know Dr. Jelliffe personally in connection with my own research interest in the function of vision. As a student of psychology, I was struck with the probable psychosomatic basis for visual changes resulting from the application of an empirical method of eyesight training known as the Bates Method.2 In the course of my research reading, I came upon Freud's article on hysterical blindness4 and Dr. Jelliffe's on “myopia as a paradigm” for psychosomatic disorder in general.7 Eager for new facts and corroborative data, I first wrote to Prof. Freud and later got in touch with Dr. Jelliffe.
In my correspondence with Freud, I described my clinical findings in the cases of myopia I had “trained” along Bates lines; and presented to him the basis for my impression that psychosomatic factors were probably involved. Freud replied, encouraging me to continue my explorations and commented, “… your observations are very interesting and may amount to an important scientific contribution, if undue generalization is avoided …” What impressed me most in my work with these cases of young adults and children centered around the altered states of feeling they experienced, obviously not attributable to the temporary improvement in vision alone.