In psychology, introjection is the unconscious adoption of the thoughts or personality traits of others.
It occurs as a normal part of development, such as a child taking on parental values and attitudes. It can also be a defence mechanism in situations that arouse anxiety.
The tendency is also known as identification or internalisation. It has been associated with both normal and pathological development.
Theory
Introjection is a concept rooted in the psychoanalytic theories of unconscious motivations. Unconscious motivation refers to processes in the mind which occur automatically and bypass conscious examination and considerations.
Introjection is the learning process or in some cases a defence mechanism where a person unconsciously absorbs experiences and makes them part their psyche.
Introjection in Learning
In psychoanalysis, introjection (German: Introjektion) refers to an unconscious process wherein one takes components of another person’s identity, such as feelings, experiences and cognitive functioning, and transfers them inside themselves, making such experiences part of their new psychic structure. These components are obliterated from consciousness (splitting), perceived in someone else (projection), and then experienced and performed (i.e. introjected) by that other person. Cognate concepts are identification, incorporation and internalisation.
Introjection as a Defence Mechanism
It is considered a self-stabilising defence mechanism used when there is a lack of full psychological contact between a child and the adults providing that child’s psychological needs. Here, it provides the illusion of maintaining relationship but at the expense of a loss of self. To use a simple example, a person who picks up traits from their friends is introjecting.
Projection has been described as an early phase of introjection.
Historic Precursors
Freud and Klein
In Freudian terms, introjection is the aspect of the ego’s system of relational mechanisms which handles checks and balances from a perspective external to what one normally considers ‘oneself’, infolding these inputs into the internal world of the self-definitions, where they can be weighed and balanced against one’s various senses of externality. For example:
“When a child envelops representational images of his absent parents into himself, simultaneously fusing them with his own personality.”
“Individuals with weak ego boundaries are more prone to use introjection as a defense mechanism.”
According to D.W. Winnicott, “projection and introjection mechanisms… let the other person be the manager sometimes, and to hand over omnipotence.”
According to Freud, the ego and the superego are constructed by introjecting external behavioural patterns into the subject’s own person. Specifically, he maintained that the critical agency or the super ego could be accounted for in terms of introjection and that the superego derives from the parents or other figures of authority. The derived behavioural patterns are not necessarily reproductions as they actually are but incorporated or introjected versions of them.
Torok and Ferenczi
However, the aforementioned description of introjection has been challenged by Maria Torok as she favours using the term as it is employed by Sándor Ferenczi in his essay “The Meaning of Introjection” (1912). In this context, introjection is an extension of autoerotic interests that broadens the ego by a lifting of repression so that it includes external objects in its make-up. Torok defends this meaning in her 1968 essay “The Illness of Mourning and the Fantasy of the Exquisite Corpse”, where she argues that Sigmund Freud and Melanie Klein confuse introjection with incorporation and that Ferenczi’s definition remains crucial to analysis. She emphasized that in failed mourning “the impotence of the process of introjection (gradual, slow, laborious, mediated, effective)” means that “incorporation is the only choice: fantasmatic, unmediated, instantaneous, magical, sometimes hallucinatory…’crypt’ effects (of incorporation)”.
Fritz and Peris
In Gestalt therapy, the concept of “introjection” is not identical with the psychoanalytical concept. Central to Fritz and Laura Perls’ modifications was the concept of “dental or oral aggression”, when the infant develops teeth and is able to chew. They set “introjection” against “assimilation”. In Ego, Hunger and Aggression, Fritz and Laura Perls suggested that when the infant develops teeth, he or she has the capacity to chew, to break apart food, and assimilate it, in contrast to swallowing before; and by analogy to experience, to taste, accept, reject or assimilate. Laura Perls explains: “I think Freud said that development takes place through introjection, but if it remains introjection and goes no further, then it becomes a block; it becomes identification. Introjection is to a great extent unawares.”
Thus Fritz and Laura Perls made “assimilation”, as opposed to “introjection”, a focal theme in Gestalt therapy and in their work, and the prime means by which growth occurs in therapy. In contrast to the psychoanalytic stance, in which the “patient” introjects the (presumably more healthy) interpretations of the analyst, in Gestalt therapy the client must “taste” with awareness their experience, and either accept or reject it, but not introject or “swallow whole”. Hence, the emphasis is on avoiding interpretation, and instead encouraging discovery. This is the key point in the divergence of Gestalt therapy from traditional psychoanalysis: growth occurs through gradual assimilation of experience in a natural way, rather than by accepting the interpretations of the analyst.
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1875 – Józef Kremer, Polish psychologist, historian, and philosopher (b. 1806).
Jozef Kremer
Józef Kremer (22 February 1806 to 02 June 1875), was a Polish historian of art, a philosopher, an aesthetician and a psychologist.
He studied at Kraków, Berlin, Heidelberg and Paris.
He was a professor of philosophy and rector of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków: 1847, assistant professor; 1850, full professor; 1865, Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy; in academic year 1870–71, rector.
He was a member of the Polish Academy of Learning from the day of its founding (1872). Professor of art history and aesthetics of Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków.
Kremer was the first proponent of Hegelianism in Poland. In 1843 he published the first volume of Listy z Krakowa (Letters from Kraków), a dissertation in aesthetics in the Hegelian spirit (vols. 1-3, Vilnius 1855-1856), which brought him recognition and renown. Also his Wykład systematyczny filozofii [A systematic course of philosophy] (vol. 1, Kraków 1849; vol. 2, Vilnius 1852), apart from the work of Karol Libelt, the first systematic textbook of philosophy in 19th-century Poland, was well received.
Kremer’s popularity and fame was, however, ensured primarily by his Podróż do Włoch (Journey to Italy; vols. 1-5, Vilnius 1859-64), which soon found place among the classics of Polish literature, and its excerpts were included in textbooks and anthologies of the day. Thanks to the efforts of Henryk Struve, in 1877-80 a twelve-volume edition of Kremer’s collected works was published in Warsaw. No other Polish philosopher contemporary of Kremer’s could boast such a publication.
Kremer’s most important achievement in psychology was the systematic division of psychic phenomena into the conscious and the unconscious, and the treatment of anthropology as a science which probes the mutual relations between these two. By considering the act as the best source of information about a person, Kremer anticipated Wilhelm Dilthey’s position.
The expressive therapies are the use of the creative arts as a form of therapy, including the distinct disciplines expressive arts therapy and the creative arts therapies (art therapy, dance/movement therapy, drama therapy, music therapy, writing therapy, poetry therapy, and psychodrama).
Unlike traditional arts expression, the process of creation is emphasized rather than the final product. The expressive therapies are based on the assumption that people can heal through the various forms of creative expression. Expressive therapists share the belief that through creative expression and the tapping of the imagination, people can examine their body, feelings, emotions, and thought process.
Brief History
Margaret Namburg, Edith Kramer, Hanna Kwiatkowska and Elinor Ulman have been credited with being the pioneers of the field of sensory art therapy. While all of these scientists made significant contributions, Margaret Namburg has been hailed the “Mother of Art Therapy”. Her work focused on the use of art, mainly as a psychoanalytic diagnostic tool. It followed closely other psychoanalytic practices of the time, and was viewed as the communication of unconscious ideas and emotions that were being expressed by the patient.
Modern Approaches
Today’s art therapy is broken down into three different approaches:
Approach
Outline
Psychodynamic
The psychodynamic approach uses terms such as “transference” and defence mechanism to describe why individuals express the art in the way they do, and why this is an expression of the subconscious.
Humanistic
The humanistic approach is more of a positive psychology approach, and is defined by an optimistic view of humans, and how expression through their art allows them to take control over these emotions.
Learning and Development
The learning and developmental approach focuses on the art therapy as a method to assist children who have emotional and developmental disabilities.
Definition and Credentialing
Expressive arts therapy is the practice of using imagery, storytelling, dance, music, drama, poetry, movement, horticulture, dreamwork, and visual arts together, in an integrated way, to foster human growth, development, and healing. Expressive arts therapy is its own distinct therapeutic discipline, an inter-modal discipline where the therapist and client move freely between drawing, dancing, music, drama, and poetry.
According to the National Organisation for Arts in Health (NOAH), what distinguishes the six creative arts therapies – art, dance/movement, drama, music and poetry therapy as well as psychodrama – from expressive arts therapy is that expressive arts therapy interventions are designed to include more than one of the “expressive” art forms (art, dance, drama, music, poetry), whereas creative arts therapists, such as art, dance/movement, drama, music, poetry and psychodrama therapists, are often intensively trained and educated to use only one modality in their practice. However, NOAH also acknowledged that the terms “are often used interchangeably in the field”, and that in any case all such professionals should collaborate closely.
The International Expressive Arts Therapy Association (IEATA) is the responsible organisation handling the credentialing of expressive arts therapists.
The National Coalition of Creative Arts Therapies Association (NCCATA) connects all six modalities of the creative arts therapies. However, each modality of the creative arts therapies has its own national association that regulates professional credentials, establishes educational standards and hosts annual conferences for the purpose of exchanging new ideas and research.
Education
Each national association of the different modalities of expressive therapies sets its own educational standards. In the United States, there are a fair number of colleges that offer approved programmes in compliance with the national associations’ credentialing requirements.
There are 37 universities for music therapy, 34 universities for art therapy, seven universities for dance/movement therapy, and five universities for drama therapy, as well as 5 universities for expressive arts therapy, that have approved master’s degree programmes in the United States. In addition, the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) has 75 undergraduate music therapy programmes approved. Once finished with an academic degree, potential therapists have to apply for credentialing at the responsible national association.
Creative Arts Therapies Modalities
There are six creative arts therapy modalities, recognised by the NCCATA, including art therapy, dance therapy, drama therapy, music therapy, poetry therapy and psychodrama. In some areas, the terms Creative Arts Therapy and Creative Arts Therapist may only be used by those who are properly licensed, as is the case in the State of New York.
Art Therapy
Created in the 1940s, Art therapy consists of the combination of psychotherapy and art. The creative process as well as the created art piece serves as a foundation for self-exploration, understanding, acceptance and eventually healing and personal growth. The creative act in therapy therefore can be seen as a means of re-experiencing inner conflict connected to resolution. The four main types are expression, imagination, active participation, and mind-body connection. Assisting in those with depression, breast cancer, and asthma, art therapy can be done at any age and does not require and skill set. Art Therapy has undergone extensive research which revealed that it decreases anxiety, increases self-concept and quality of life, and reduces negative thoughts. With two main goals in mind, Art Therapy strives to enhance personal and relational goals for those in need. Self-esteem, social skills, and cognitive functions are also said to be an area of importance. A certified art therapist is essential in order for the therapy to ensure improvement, however common art therapy using even a friend to discuss trauma can be enough to help someone.
Dance/Movement Therapy
Like other creative arts therapy modalities, dance/movement therapy is based on the assumption that “mind, body and spirit are inseparable and interconnected” (ADTA). Movement is the primary tool of intervention in a therapy session, but dance/movement therapy also uses the art of play in therapy. Like other creative art therapies it uses primarily nonverbal communication. Dance and movement therapy has shown to be the most beneficial in those who enjoy exercises that involve less talking an expression through movements.
Drama Therapy
Drama therapy refers to the combination of the two disciplines drama/theatre and psychotherapy. Drama Therapy, as a hybrid of both disciplines, uses theatre techniques to treat individuals with mental health, cognitive, and developmental disorders. Through the art of play and pretend, patients gain perspective in therapy to their life experiences, which in the field is referred to as “aesthetic distance”.
Music Therapy
Music Therapy is the use of music, music-making, or other music-related interventions within a therapeutic relationship. Music therapy is a broad field with many areas and populations to specialize in. A holistic practice, music therapy can address emotional/psychological, cognitive, communication, motor, sensory, pain, social, behavioural, end of life, and even spiritual needs. This is due in part to music being processed in many areas of the brain. Music therapy helps patients “communicate, process difficult experiences, and improve motor or cognitive functioning” (Jenni Rook, MT-BC, LCPC, 2016). When used as psychotherapy, at its core, music therapy may use music as a symbolic representation and expression of the psychological world of the individual.
Music Therapy also benefits a variety of disorders, like cardiac and mental disorders. It aids those who suffer from depression, anxiety, autism, substance abuse, and Alzheimer’s. In cases where a person is suffering from mental disorders, music relieves stress, improves self-esteem, etc. Evidence has shown that people who have used Music Therapy in the past have improved in several aspects of life that do not concern just those suffering from mental illness. In music therapy people may improve their singing which may then impact their ability to speak. Therefore, it can change several aspects of life, not just those of helping mental illness.
Poetry Therapy
Poetry therapy (also referred to using the broader term bibliotherapy) stands out from other creative arts therapies, which are all based on the assumption of the existence of a language that functions without words. Poetry therapy, however, is the use of the written word to bring healing and personal growth.
Psychodrama
Psychodrama is a distinct form of psychotherapy developed by Jacob L. Moreno in the early 20th century. Moreno, a trained psychoanalyst himself, had the goal of creating a more effective, action-based form of psychoanalysis as developed by Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. He developed a clear three phase structure (warm up, action, sharing) to his therapy as well as multiple intervention-methods that are still used by psychodrama therapists today.
Although related, psychodrama and drama therapy describe different modalities within the field of creative arts therapies. Whereas psychodrama uses real-life experience of the patients in therapy to “practice new and more effective roles and behaviors” (ASGPP), drama therapy lets the patients explore more fictional stories, such as improvised scenes, myths or fairy tales.
Benefits
Benefit
Outline
Self-Discovery
This discovery often leads to a relief of emotional tension caused by past events, and can be used as a coping mechanism.
Empowerment
Art therapy gives individuals the ability to articulate their fears and stresses in a non-conventional way, and often leads to sense of control over these emotions.
Stress Relief
Effective for stress relief by itself, but can provide even better results if paired with other relaxation devices such as guided imagery.
Physical Pain Relief and Rehabilitation
Art therapy has been shown to help decrease pain in patients who are recovering from illness and injury. It has also been used in patients who are chronically or terminally ill, to provide relief and pain control.
Empirical Evidence
Ball (2002)
Ball conducted long-term research on five children who were considered to be severely emotionally disturbed. These children participated in 50 art therapy sessions, and the results suggested that the art therapy was successful, and the children showed marked progress in their treatment over the course of the 50 sessions.
Pifalo (2006)
In this study, 41 girls or young women who had been sexually abused were given structured group art therapy for eight weeks, and were measured before treatment using the Briere’s Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children (TSCC). They were given the test again after the treatment, and for 9 out of 10 of the girls, a statistically significant reduction in scores on the test were observed.
Bar-Sela, Atid, Danos, Gabay & Epelbaum (2007)
This study worked with 60 adults who had cancer. These adults attended weekly individual art therapy, in addition to watercolour painting classes. After just four sessions, the experimental group saw marked and significant improvement in depression and fatigue, as measured by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and a brief fatigue inventory. While they showed a decrease in depression, there was no significant difference in the levels of anxiety of the patients.
Gusak (2006)
In this study, the researcher worked with 29 incarcerated men. The men attended eight sessions of group art therapy, and were tested before and after the treatment using the Beck Depression Inventory Short Form. After the eight sessions, all of the men showed significant improvement in the symptoms of depression and their score on the Beck Depression Inventory reflected these improvements.
Bulfone et al. (2009)
In this study Bulfone et al. utilised music therapy as their treatment. 60 women who had been diagnosed with stage 1 or 2 breast cancer were randomly assigned to a control or experimental group. The control group received standard assistance before chemotherapy, while the experimental group had the chance to listen to music before the chemotherapy began. The results showed that the anxiety levels of the experimental group were significantly lower than those of the control group, and also showed a significantly lower level of depression.
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1952 – John Dewey, American psychologist and philosopher (b. 1859).
John Dewey
John Dewey (20 October 1859 to 01 June 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overriding theme of Dewey’s works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education, or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, “Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous.” Dewey considered two fundamental elements – schools and civil society – to be major topics needing attention and reconstruction to encourage experimental intelligence and plurality. He asserted that complete democracy was to be obtained not just by extending voting rights but also by ensuring that there exists a fully formed public opinion, accomplished by communication among citizens, experts and politicians, with the latter being accountable for the policies they adopt.
Dewey was one of the primary figures associated with the philosophy of pragmatism and is considered one of the fathers of functional psychology. His paper “The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology,” published in 1896, is regarded as the first major work in the (Chicago) functionalist school of psychology. A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked Dewey as the 93rd-most-cited psychologist of the 20th century.
Dewey was also a major educational reformer for the 20th century. A well-known public intellectual, he was a major voice of progressive education and liberalism. While a professor at the University of Chicago, he founded the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, where he was able to apply and test his progressive ideas on pedagogical method. Although Dewey is known best for his publications about education, he also wrote about many other topics, including epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, art, logic, social theory, and ethics.
Expressive suppression is the intentional reduction of facial expression of an emotion, and it is a component of emotion regulation.
Expressive suppression is a concept:
“based on individuals’ emotion knowledge, which includes knowledge about the causes of emotion, about their bodily sensations and expressive behavior, and about the possible means of modifying them”.
In other words, expressive suppression signifies the act of masking facial giveaways (refer to facial expression) in order to hide an underlying emotional state (refer to affect). In fact, simply suppressing the facial expressions that accompany certain emotions can affect “the individual’s experience of emotion”. According to a 1974 study conducted by Kopel and Arkowitz, repressing the facial expressions associated with pain actually decreased the experience of pain in participants. However, “there is little evidence that the suppression of spontaneous emotional expression leads to decrease in emotional experience and physiological arousal apart from the manipulation of the pain expressions”.
According to Gross and Levenson’s 1993 study in which subjects watched a disgusting film while suppressing or not suppressing their expressions, suppression produced increased blinking. However, suppression also produced a decreased heart rate in participants and self-reports did not reflect that suppression had an effect on disgust experience. While it is unclear from Gross and Levenson’s study whether suppression successfully diminishes the experience of emotions, it can be concluded that expressive suppression does not completely inhibit all facial movements and expressions (e.g. blinking of the eyes). Niedenthal argues that expressive suppression works to decrease the experience of positive emotions whereas it does not successfully decrease the experience of negative emotions. If the suppression of facial expressions does not diminish negative emotions that one experiences, why is it such a common practice?
It may be that expressive suppression serves more of a social purpose than it serves a purpose for the individual. In a study done by Kleck and colleagues in 1976, participants were told to suppress facial expressions of pain during the reception of electric shocks. Specifically, “in one study the subjects were induced to exaggerate or minimize their facial expressions in order to fool a supposed audience”. This idea of covering up an internal experience in front of observers could be the true reason that expressive suppression is utilised in social situations. “In everyday life, suppression may serve to conform individuals’ outward appearance to emotional norms in a given situation, and to facilitate social interaction”. In this way, hiding negative emotions may cause for more successful social relationships by preventing conflict, stifling the spread of negative emotions, and protecting an individual from negative judgments made by others.
Component
Expressive suppression is a response-focused emotion regulation strategy. This strategy involves an individual voluntarily suppressing their outward emotional expressions. Expressive suppression has a direct relationship to our emotional experiences and is significant in communication studies. Individuals who suppress their emotions are seeking to control their actions and are seeking to maintain a positive social image. Expressive suppression involves reducing facial expression and controlling positive and negative feelings of emotion. This type of emotion regulation strategy can have negative emotional and psychological effects on individuals. Emotional suppression reduces expressive behaviour significantly. As many researchers have concluded, though emotional suppression decreases outward expressive emotions, it does not decrease our negative feelings and emotional arousal.
Different forms of emotion regulation affect our response trajectory of emotions. We target situations for regulation by the process of selecting the situations we are exposed to or by modifying the situation we are in. Emotion suppression relates to the behavioural component of emotion. Expressive suppression has physiological influences such as decreasing heart rate, increasing blood pressure, and increasing sympathetic activation.
Expressive suppression requires self-control. We use self-control when handling our emotion-based expressions in public. It is believed that the use of expressive suppression has a negative connection with a human’s well-being. Expressive suppression has been found to occur late, after the peripheral physiological response or emotion process is triggered. Künh et al. (2011) compare this strategy to vetoing actions. This type of emotion regulation strategy is considered a method which strongly resists various urges and voluntarily inhibits actions. Kühn et al. (2011) also posited the notion that expression suppression may be internally controlled and that emotional responses are targeted by suppression efforts.
One of the characteristics of expressive suppression, a response-based strategy, is that it occurs after an activated response. Larsen et al. (2013) claim expressive suppression to be one of the less effective emotion regulation strategies. These researchers label expressive suppression as an inhibition to the behavioural display of emotion.
Externalisers vs. Internalisers
Regarding emotion regulation, specifically expressive suppression, there are two groups that can be characterised by their different response patterns. These two groups are labelled externalisers and internalisers. Internalisers generally “show more skin conductance deflections and greater heart rate acceleration than do externalizers” when attempting to suppress facial expressions during a potentially emotional event. This signifies that internalisers are able to successfully employ expressive suppression while experiencing physiological arousal. However, when asked to describe their feelings, internalisers do not usually speak about themselves or specific feelings, which could be a sign of alexithymia. Alexithymia is defined as the inability to verbally explain an emotional experience or a feeling. Peter Sifneos first used this word in the realm of psychiatry in 1972 and it literally means “having no words for emotions”. Those who are able to consistently suppress their facial expressions (e.g. internalisers) may be experiencing symptoms of alexithymia. On the other hand, externalisers employ less expressive suppression in response to emotional experiences or other external stimuli and do not usually struggle with alexithymia.
Gender Differences
Men and women do not equally utilise expressive suppression. Typically, men show less facial expression and employ more expressive suppression than do women. This behaviour difference rooted in gender difference can be traced back to social norms that are taught to children at a young age. Young boys are implicitly taught that “big boys don’t cry,” which is a lesson that encourages the suppression of emotional behaviour in masculine individuals. This suppression is a result of “the punishment and consequent conditioned inhibition of all expression of a given emotion”. If a masculine individual expresses an emotion that is undesirable and society responds by punishing that behaviour, that masculine individual will learn to suppress the socially unacceptable behaviour. On the other hand, feminine individuals do not experience the same societal pressure to the same extent to suppress their emotional expressions. Because feminine individuals are not as pressured to keep their emotions concealed, most do not feel the need to suppress them. However, there are exceptions.
Vs. Display Rules
Complete expressive suppression means that no facial expressions are visible to exemplify a given emotion. However, display rules are examples of a controlled form of expression management and “involve the learned manipulation of facial expression to agree with cultural conventions and interpersonal expectations in the pursuit of tactical and/or strategic social ends” The utilisation of display rules differs from expressive suppression because when display rules are enacted, the action to manage expression is voluntary, controlled, and incorporates certain types of expressive behaviour. Conversely, expressive suppression is involuntary and is the result of social pressures that shape subconscious behaviours. It is not a controlled action nor does expressive suppression involve the manipulation of voluntary expressions, it is only manifested in the absence of expression. There are three ways in which facial expression displays may be influenced: modulation, qualification, and falsification. Modulation refers to the act of showing a different amount of expression than one feels. Qualification requires the addition of an extra (unfelt) emotional expression to the expression of a felt emotion. Lastly, falsification has three separate components. Falsification incorporates:
Expressing an unfelt emotion (simulation);
Expressing no emotion when an emotion is felt (neutralisation); or
Concealing a felt emotion by expressing an unfelt emotion (masking).
A Response-Focused Strategy
Expressive suppression is an emotion management strategy that works to decrease positive emotional experiences, however, it has not been proven to reduce the experience of negative emotions. This strategy is a response-focused form of emotion regulation, which “refers to things we do once an emotion is underway and response tendencies have already been generated”. Response-focused strategies are generally not as successful as antecedent-focused regulation strategies, which refers to “things we do, either consciously or automatically, before emotion-response tendencies have become fully activated”. Srivastava and colleagues performed a study in 2009 in which the effectiveness of students’ use of expressive suppression was analysed in the transition period between high school and college. This study concluded that “suppression is an antecedent of poor social functioning” in the domains of social support, closeness, and social satisfaction.
Psychological Consequences
Suppressing the expression of emotion is one of the most frequent emotion-regulation strategies utilized by human beings. Clinical traditions state that a person’s psychological health is based upon how affective impulses are regulated; the consequences of affective regulation have become, therefore, a main focus of psychological researchers. The psychological consequences directly related to expressive suppression are frequently disputed. Some early 20th-century researchers state that suppressing a physical emotional response while emotionally aroused will increase the emotional experience due to concentration on suppressing that emotion. These researchers argue that common sense tells us emotions become more severe the longer they are bottled up. Other researchers dispute this theory, saying that emotional expression is so significant to the overall emotional response that when suppression occurs, all other responses (e.g. physiological) are weakened. These researchers solidify this argument with the tradition that people are taught to count to ten when emotionally aroused in order to calm themselves down. If suppressing emotions were to increase the emotional experience, this counting exercise would only intensify a person’s reactions. However, it has been deemed to do the opposite. Unfortunately, few studies have been carried out to test these hypotheses. The idea that people have conflicting views on what is better – to bottle up emotions by counting to ten before acting/speaking or to release emotions as bottling them up is bad for your mental health – is of constant interest to researchers in the field of emotion. These differing views on such a commonplace human behaviour suggest that expressive suppression is one of the more complicated emotion-regulation techniques.
As a solution to these opposing ideas, it has been suggested (and mentioned in the Externalisers vs. Internalisers section above) that people have a tendency to be either emotionally expressive (externalisers) or inexpressive (internalisers). The habitual use of one expressive technique over the other leads to different psychological and physiological consequences over time. Expressive behaviour is directly related to emotional suppression as it is assumed that internalisers consciously choose not to express themselves. However, this assumption has gone primarily untested with the exception of a 1979 study by Notarius and Levenson, whose research found that internalisers are more physiologically reactive to emotional stimuli than externalisers. One explanation for these findings was that when a behavioural emotional response is suppressed it must be released in other ways, in this case physiological reactions. These findings lend themselves to the suggestion by Cannon (1927) and Jones (1935) that emotional suppression intensifies other reactions.
It has also been suggested that illness and disease is increased by continued emotional suppression, especially the suppression of intensely aggressive emotions such as anger and hostility which can lead to hypertension and coronary heart-disease. As well as physical illness, expressive suppression is said to be the cause of mental illnesses such as depression. Many psychotherapists will try to relieve their patients’ illness/strain by teaching them expressive techniques in a controlled environment or within the particular relationship in which their suppressed emotions are causing problems. A counter-argument to this idea suggests that expressive suppression is an important part of emotional regulation that needs to be learned due to its beneficial use in adulthood. Adults must learn to successfully suppress certain emotional responses (e.g. those to anger which could have destructive social consequences). However, then the question is whether or not to suppress all anger-related responses, or to release those less volatile in order to reduce the risk of contracting physical and mental illnesses. The Clinical Theory implies that there is an optimum level between total suppression and total expression which, during adulthood, a person must find in order to protect their physical and psychological being.
While expressive suppression may be socially acceptable in certain situations, it cannot be considered a healthy practice at all times. Concealing and suppressing expressions can cause stress-related physiological reactions. Stress occurs because “the social disapproval and punishment of overt emotional expression that causes suppression is itself intimidating and stressful”. There are several occupations which require the suppression of positive or negative emotions, such as estate agents masking their happiness when an offer is placed on a house to maintain their professionalism, or elementary-school teachers suppressing their anger so as to not upset their young students when teaching them right from wrong. Only in recent studies have researchers begun looking into the effects that continual suppression of emotion in the workplace has on people. Continual suppression causes strain on those utilising it, especially on those who may be natural externalisers. Strain elicited by such suppression can cause an elevated heart-rate, increased anxiety, low commitment and other effects which can be detrimental to an employee. The common conception is that expressive suppression in the workplace is beneficial for the organization and dangerous for the employee over long periods of time.[citation needed] However, in a 2005 study, Cote found that factors contributing to the social dynamics of emotions determine when emotion regulation increases, decreases, or does not affect strain at all. The suppression of unpleasant emotions such as anger contribute to increasing high levels of strain
Link with Depression
Expressive suppression, as an emotion regulation strategy, serves different purposes such as supporting goal pursuits and satisfying hedonic needs. Though expressive suppression is considered a weak influence on the experience of emotion, it has other functions. Expressive suppression is a goal-oriented strategy which is guided by people’s beliefs and potentially by abstract theories about emotion regulation. In a 2012 study by Larsen and colleagues, the researchers looked at the positive association between expressive suppression and depressive symptoms among adults and adolescents which are influenced by parental support and peer victimisation. They found a reciprocal relationship between parental support and depressive symptoms. The same was not true for the relationship between peer victimisation and depressive symptoms. Depressive symptoms followed decreased perception of parental support one year later. They found that initial suppression occurred after increases in depressive symptoms one year later, yet depression did not occur after suppression.
However, in a continuation of their original study, Larsen and colleagues found that this relationship between suppression and depression was reversed. Depressive symptoms occurred after the use of suppression, and suppression did not occur after future depressive symptoms. The authors of this study support that expressive suppression has physiological, social, and cognitive costs. Some evidence says that “depressed people judge their negative emotions as less socially acceptable” than non-depressed people. ”Appraising one’s emotions as unacceptable mediates the relationship between negative emotion intensity and use of suppression”.
Negative Social Consequences
As an appropriate level of expressive suppression is important for physiological and psychological health, it is equally as important for the maintenance of social situations. However, excessive use of expressive suppression can negatively affect social interactions. While expressive suppression may seem like an easier way of coping with emotions in society or of becoming more likable in a social environment, it actually alters behaviour in a way that is visible and undesirable to others. Because expressive suppression is an action that occurs in social interactions, it is reasonable that this emotion regulation strategy would have social implications. Specifically, suppression involves three social costs. The act of suppressing facial expressions prohibits others in the social world from gaining information about a suppressor’s emotional state. This can prevent a suppressor from receiving social emotional benefits such as sympathy or sharing in collective positive and negative emotions that “facilitate social bonding”. Secondly, expressive suppression is not always fully successful. If a suppressor accidentally shows signs of concealed feelings, others may perceive that the suppressor is covering up true emotions and may assume that the suppressor is insincere and uninterested in forming legitimate social relationships. Lastly, expressive suppression is hard work and therefore requires more cognitive processing than freely communicating emotions. If a suppressor is unable to devote full attention to social interactions because he/she is using cognitive power to suppress, the suppressor will not be able to remain engaged nor put in the work to maintain relationships.
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1996 – Timothy Leary, American psychologist and author (b. 1920).
2011 – Hans Keilson, German-Dutch psychoanalyst and author (b. 1909).
Timothy Leary
Timothy Francis Leary (22 October 1920 to 31 May 1996) was an American psychologist and writer known for his strong advocacy of psychedelic drugs. Evaluations of Leary are polarised, ranging from bold oracle to publicity hound. He was “a hero of American consciousness”, according to Allen Ginsberg, and Tom Robbins called him a “brave neuronaut”.
As a clinical psychologist at Harvard University, Leary worked on the Harvard Psilocybin Project from 1960 to 1962. He tested the therapeutic effects of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and psilocybin, which were still legal in the United States at the time, in the Concord Prison Experiment and the Marsh Chapel Experiment. The scientific legitimacy and ethics of his research were questioned by other Harvard faculty because he took psychedelics along with research subjects and pressured students to join in. However, the claim that Leary pressured unwilling students was denied by one of Leary’s students, Robert Thurman. Leary and his colleague, Richard Alpert (who later became known as Ram Dass), were fired from Harvard University in May 1963. Many people of the time only came to know of psychedelics after the Harvard scandal.
Leary believed that LSD showed potential for therapeutic use in psychiatry. He used LSD himself and developed a philosophy of mind expansion and personal truth through LSD. After leaving Harvard, he continued to publicly promote the use of psychedelic drugs and became a well-known figure of the counterculture of the 1960s. He popularised catchphrases that promoted his philosophy, such as “turn on, tune in, drop out”, “set and setting”, and “think for yourself and question authority”. He also wrote and spoke frequently about transhumanist concepts of space migration, intelligence increase, and life extension (SMI²LE). Leary developed the eight-circuit model of consciousness in his book Exo-Psychology (1977) and gave lectures, occasionally billing himself as a “performing philosopher”.
During the 1960s and 1970s, he was arrested 36 times worldwide. President Richard Nixon once described Leary as “the most dangerous man in America”.
Hans Keilson
Hans Alex Keilson (12 December 1909 to 31 May 2011) was a German-Dutch novelist, poet, psychoanalyst and child psychologist. He was best known for his novels set during the Second World War, during which he was an active member of the Dutch resistance.
Keilson, having worked with traumatized orphans, mainly wrote about traumas induced by the war. His first novel was published in 1934, but most of his works were published after the war. In 2010, The New York Times ‘s Francine Prose described Keilson as “one of the world’s greatest writers”, notably honouring Keilson’s achievements in the year in which he turned 101 years old.
1879 – Konstantin Ramul, Estonian psychologist and academic (d. 1975).
Konstantin Ramul
Konstantin Ramul (30 May 1879 to 11 February 1975) was an Estonian professor of psychology and longtime chair of psychology at the University of Tartu.
He is best known for his work on the history of experimental psychology.
Ramul believed that history is dependent upon psychology, though the philosopher of science Ernest Nagel criticised him for “not stat[ing] clearly the type of psychological investigation which is relevant to the historian’s task” (Nagel, 1934, p.599-600).
Reference
Nagel, E. (1934) The Eighth International Congress of Philosophy. Journal of Philosophy. 31(21), pp.589-601.
1966 – Ignace Lepp, Estonian-French priest and psychologist (b. 1909).
Ignace Lepp
Ignace Lepp (born John Robert Lepp; 26 October 1909 to 29 May 1966), was a French writer of Estonian origin.
According to his book Atheism in Our Time, Lepp was an atheist and Marxist for many years and claimed to have occupied important positions in the communist party with whom he later became very disillusioned. He then converted to Roman Catholicism and was ordained a priest in 1941. He wrote many non-fiction books including some about atheism, religion, and later psychiatry, as he was a psychologist and psychoanalyst.
He wrote among other books: The Ways of Friendship, The Psychology of Loving, The Authentic Existence, The Communication of Existences. He also wrote The faith of men; meditations inspired by Teilhard de Chardin (Teilhard et la foi des homme), about the French thinker Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.
André Green (12 March 1927 to 22 January 2012) was a French psychoanalyst.
Life and Career
André Green was born in Cairo, Egypt, to non observant Jewish parents. He studied medicine (specialising in psychiatry) at Paris Medical School and worked at several hospitals. Then, in 1965, after having finished his training as a psychoanalyst, he became a member of the Paris Psychoanalytic Society (SPP), of which he was the president from 1986 to 1989. From 1975 to 1977 he was a vice president of the International Psychoanalytical Association and from 1979 to 1980 a professor at University College London. He died, aged 84, in Paris.
André Green was the author of numerous papers and books on the theory and practice of psychoanalysis and the psychoanalytic criticism of culture and literature, many of which have also appeared in English translations.
Intellectual Development
Encounter with Lacan
In the early 1960s, Green could be found attending Lacan’s seminar, without abandoning his affiliation to the SPP – a bold decision which for some time enabled him to straddle the competing strands of French psychoanalysis from an independent position. As the decade progressed however, he moved further from Lacan, and finally broke with the latter in 1970 by criticising his concept of the signifier for its neglect of affect.
By doing so, he replaced the SPP’s normally defensive approach towards Lacanianism with a direct theoretical confrontation. Most tellingly, Green points out that whereas “Lacan is saying that the unconscious is structured like a language…when you read Freud, it is obvious that this proposition doesn’t work for a minute. Freud very clearly opposes the unconscious (which he says is constituted by thing-presentations and nothing else) to the pre-conscious. What is related to language can only belong to the pre-conscious”.
The Greenian Synthesis
Over the decades since, R. Horacio Etchegoyen concluded that what he called “the complex itinerary of Andre Green’s prolific work” has continued to demonstrate the intellectually independent way in which “Green is a Freudian analyst who has managed to integrate in a lucid synthesis the influence of authors as diverse as Lacan, Bion, and, especially, Winnicott”.
The result was to make André Green one of the most important psychoanalytic thinkers of our times – the creator of what has been called a Greenian theory of psychoanalysis (Kohon, 1999). Building on Freudian metapsychology, Green elaborated a further theory of the unrepresentable, relating thinking to absence as well as to sexuality.
While containing a multiplicity of local contributions – on the central phobic position; subjective disengagement; unconscious recognition; the dead mother; and more – the Greenian psychoanalytic framework has been seen as a totality, producing something greater than the sum of its parts.
Theoretical Contributions
On the Work of the Negative
A significant part of Green’s contribution to contemporary psychoanalysis has centred on his exploration of ‘the different modalities of the work of the negative’. He has highlighted the way ‘accepting the negation of what was there is necessary for relationships to new things to become possible’ – the way that ‘to accept the reality of lack…opens the door, through a process of working-through, to new experience, new ideals and new object-relationships’.
On the Analytic Setting
For Green, the analytic setting is in itself a recreation of psychic reality. ‘The symbolism of the setting comprises a triangular paradigm, uniting the three polarities of the dream (narcissism), of maternal caring (from the mother, following Winnicott), and of the prohibition of incest (from the father, following Freud). What the psychoanalytic apparatus gives rise to, then, is the symbolisation of the unconscious structure of the Oedipus Complex ‘.
On Dreams
Dreams are, ‘for Andre Green, negative states trying to accede to symbolization’, so that, as ‘summed up by Adam Phillips: “Dreams and affects, and states of emptiness or absence have been the essential perplexities of Green’s work because they are the areas of experience…in which the nature of representation itself is put at risk”‘.
Moral Narcissism
Green saw moral narcissism as the attempt to elevate oneself above ordinary human needs and attachments – an ascetic attempt at creating an impregnable sense of moral superiority.
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Olmstead v. L.C., 527 U.S. 581 (1999), is a United States Supreme Court case regarding discrimination against people with mental disabilities.
The Supreme Court held that under the Americans with Disabilities Act, individuals with mental disabilities have the right to live in the community rather than in institutions if, in the words of the opinion of the Court, “the State’s treatment professionals have determined that community placement is appropriate, the transfer from institutional care to a less restrictive setting is not opposed by the affected individual, and the placement can be reasonably accommodated, taking into account the resources available to the State and the needs of others with mental disabilities.”
The case was brought by the Atlanta Legal Aid Society, Inc.
Background
Tommy Olmstead, Commissioner, Georgia Department of Human Resources, et al. v. L. C., by Zimring, guardian ad litem and next friend, et al. (Olmstead v. L.C.) was a case filed in 1995 and decided in 1999 before the United States Supreme Court. The plaintiffs, L.C. (Lois Curtis) and E.W. (Elaine Wilson, deceased 04 December 2005), two women were diagnosed with schizophrenia, intellectual disability and personality disorder. They had both been treated in institutional settings and in community based treatments in the state of Georgia.
Guardian ad litem: A legal guardian is a person who has been appointed by a court or otherwise has the legal authority to care for the personal and property interests of another person, called a ward.
Next Friend: In common law, a next friend is a person who represents another person who is underage, or, because of disability or otherwise, is unable to maintain a suit on his or her own behalf and who does not have a legal guardian. Also known as litigation friends.
Following clinical assessments by state employees, both plaintiffs were determined to be better suited for treatment in a community-based setting rather than in the institution. The plaintiffs remained confined in the institution, each for several years after the initial treatment was concluded. Both sued the state of Georgia to prevent them from being inappropriately treated and housed in the institutional setting.
Opinion of the Court
The case rose to the level of the United States Supreme Court, which decided the case in 1999, and plays a major role in determining that mental illness is a form of disability and therefore covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Title II of the ADA applies to ‘public entities’ and include ‘state and local governments’ and ‘any department, agency or special purpose district’ and protects any ‘qualified person with a disability’ from exclusion from participation in or denied the benefits of services, programs, or activities of a public entity.
The Supreme Court decided mental illness is a form of disability and that “unjustified isolation” of a person with a disability is a form of discrimination under Title II of the ADA. The Supreme Court held that community placement is only required and appropriate (i.e. institutionalisation is unjustified), when:
The State’s treatment professionals have determined that community placement is appropriate;
The transfer from institutional care to a less restrictive setting is not opposed by the affected individual; and
The placement can be reasonably accommodated, taking into account the resources available to the State and the needs of others with mental disabilities.
Unjustified isolation is discrimination based on disability. Olmstead v. L.C., 527 U.S. 581, 587 (1999).
The Supreme Court explained that this holding “reflects two evident judgments.”
First, “institutional placement of persons who can handle and benefit from community settings perpetuates unwarranted assumptions that persons so isolated are incapable or unworthy of participating in community life.”
Second, historically “confinement in an institution severely diminishes the everyday life activities of individuals, including family relations, social contacts, work options, economic independence, educational advancement, and cultural enrichment.” Id. at 600-601.
However, a majority of Justices in Olmstead also recognized an ongoing role for publicly and privately operated institutions:
“We emphasize that nothing in the ADA or its implementing regulations condones termination of institutional settings for persons unable to handle or benefit from community settings…Nor is there any federal requirement that community-based treatment be imposed on patients who do not desire it.” Id. at 601-602.
A plurality of Justices noted: “[N]o placement outside the institution may ever be appropriate . . . ‘Some individuals, whether mentally retarded or mentally ill, are not prepared at particular times – perhaps in the short run, perhaps in the long run – for the risks and exposure of the less protective environment of community settings ’ for these persons, ‘institutional settings are needed and must remain available’” (quoting Amicus Curiae Brief for the American Psychiatric Association, et al). “As already observed [by the majority], the ADA is not reasonably read to impel States to phase out institutions, placing patients in need of close care at risk… ‘Each disabled person is entitled to treatment in the most integrated setting possible for that person—recognizing on a case-by-case basis, that setting may be an institution’[quoting VOR’s Amici Curiae brief].” Id. at 605.
Justice Kennedy noted in his concurring opinion, “It would be unreasonable, it would be a tragic event, then, were the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) to be interpreted so that states had some incentive, for fear of litigation to drive those in need of medical care and treatment out of appropriate care and into settings with too little assistance and supervision.” Id. at 610.
The Supreme Court did not reach the question of whether there is a constitutional right to community services in the most integrated setting.
About ten years after the Olmstead decision, the State of Georgia and the United States Department of Justice entered a settlement agreement to cease all admissions of individuals with developmental disabilities to state-operated, federally licensed institutions (“State Hospitals”) and, by 01 July 2015, “transition all individuals with developmental disabilities in the State Hospitals from the Hospitals to community settings,” according to a Department of Justice Fact Sheet about the settlement. The settlement also calls for serving 9,000 individuals with mental illness in community settings. Recently, the federal court’s Independent Reviewer for the settlement found significant health and safety risks, including many deaths, plaguing former State Hospital residents due to their transition from a licensed facility home to community-settings per the settlement. The Court has approved a moratorium on such transfers until the safety of those impacted can be assured.
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