"Feeling good in your own skin" part I: primary levels of mental organization.
Summary of ""Feeling good in your own skin" part I: primary levels of mental organization."
This two-part article (the first part published here and the second part will be published in the March 2011 Issue of the AJP), deals with the relation between a certain type of idiomatic expression, which we call somatic idioms, and what we recognize as the primary levels of mental organization. The article raises the following questions: What do we actually know about the primary levels of mental organization? What is the language's way to connect with the primary levels of mental organization? The first part of the article addresses the issue of how to describe and conceptualize the individual's earliest experiences, and how they continue to exist throughout one's adult life. The second part of the article focuses on the accessibility of the primary levels to language. Whereas most of the theories identify the primary levels as being outside of the linguistic realm, we suggest that some idiomatic expressions are the language's way to get in touch or connect with the primary levels. Therefore, the goals of the present article are to (1) characterize the primary levels of mental organization differently from the ways in which other psychoanalytic schools have done up until now; (2) reveal how language manages to find a way to connect with these primary levels, which are not outside of the linguistic realm, as has been previously suggested; and (3) exemplify the frequency and wide range of mental states-not only those which are pathological or extreme-in which the primary levels can be identified.
Affiliation
Journal Details
This article was published in the following journal.
Name: American journal of psychoanalysis
ISSN: 1573-6741
Pages: 361-85
Links
- PubMed Source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21116290
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/ajp.2010.26
Medical and Biotech [MESH] Definitions
Primary Prevention
Specific practices for the prevention of disease or mental disorders in susceptible individuals or populations. These include HEALTH PROMOTION, including mental health; protective procedures, such as COMMUNICABLE DISEASE CONTROL; and monitoring and regulation of ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTANTS. Primary prevention is to be distinguished from SECONDARY PREVENTION and TERTIARY PREVENTION.
Guilt
Subjective feeling of having committed an error, offense or sin; unpleasant feeling of self-criticism. These result from acts, impulses, or thoughts contrary to one's personal conscience.
Mental Disorders
Psychiatric illness or diseases manifested by breakdowns in the adaptational process expressed primarily as abnormalities of thought, feeling, and behavior producing either distress or impairment of function.
Affect
The feeling-tone accompaniment of an idea or mental representation. It is the most direct psychic derivative of instinct and the psychic representative of the various bodily changes by means of which instincts manifest themselves.
Double Effect Principle
Guideline for determining when it is morally permissible to perform an action to pursue a good end with knowledge that the action will also bring about bad results. It generally states that, in cases where a contemplated action has such double effect, the action is permissible only if: it is not wrong in itself; the bad result is not intended; the good result is not a direct causal result of the bad result; and the good result is "proportionate to" the bad result. (from Solomon, "Double Effect," in Becker, The Encyclopedia of Ethics, 1992)
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