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This article chapters:
01. The psychoanalytic school has made great contributions in the history of psychology
02. From a modern point of view, psychoanalysis has great limitations
03. If the psychoanalytic school does not know how to keep pace with the times, it will become non-mainstream
The picture comes from the Internet
More and more teenagers are now being diagnosed with depression, bipolar disorder, and even schizophrenia, and more and more parents are valuing their children's mental health. Many parents will consciously learn about psychology, and if their child is diagnosed with a mental disorder, parents will also consciously seek out psychological counseling/psychotherapy resources.
Even if it is not a parent group, the general public as a whole has a higher and higher thirst for mental health and psychological knowledge.
When talking about psychology, it seems that we must talk about "psychoanalysis"; When we talk about psychoanalysis, we have to talk about Freud. Many parents who seek counseling/psychotherapy will almost inevitably come into contact with a psychoanalyst.
In 2022, Zeng Qifeng, a top psychoanalyst and deputy chief physician of the Department of Psychiatry in China, once said that 70%~80% of the psychological counselors working in the front line in China are psychoanalytical, which shows how much "weight" this school occupies in China.
Recently, we have pushed a number of articles to interpret the pros and cons of the psychoanalytic school in the clinical practice of mental and psychological disorders, and also interpreted some views of Wu Zhihong and Zeng Qifeng, well-known psychoanalysts in China.
Of course, our perspective is not based on the school of psychoanalysis, but on the precise psychopsychology, which can penetrate into the level of people's implicit memory, so that our interpretation is deeper and closer to the truth.
The above articles have attracted a lot of discussion from netizens, some in favor, some in question or even against. This is perfectly normal and to be expected. Almost any point of view is presented in conflict with others.
Today's article is mainly to make some brief summaries of the "merits and demerits" of the psychoanalytic school. Whether netizens agree with it or not, I hope it can trigger some more in-depth thinking, especially hope that patients with mental disorders and their families should remain rational when facing the psychoanalytic school.
01. The psychoanalytic school has made great contributions in the history of psychology
It is undeniable that Freud founded the psychoanalytic school in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which is of great significance.
Some people say that Freud, Einstein, and Marx are the three Jews who changed the world in the 20th century. I don't think that's an exaggeration. Even though Freud's classical psychoanalytic theory was questioned and even criticized a lot at the time and in later generations, it could not change his great contribution.
Sigmund Freud himself was a medical doctor, and he lived in a time when many people thought that mental disorders were moral issues or demonic possession. Freud proposed that the root cause of these diseases is actually a problem at the deep psychological level of the individual, and a large part of it comes from acquired experience.
His theories were groundbreaking at the time, and they not only influenced psychology, but also had a profound impact on literature, philosophy, education, aesthetics, sociology, and other fields.
Freud himself was also a man of letters, and he wrote fluently, publishing more than 10 German books in his lifetime. At the age of 74, he was awarded the Gothic Prize, the German Prize for Literature. Freud was also nominated for the Nobel Prize many times, which shows how influential he and his theories were.
Although some of the classical psychoanalytic theories he put forward were later overturned by his disciples such as Jung and considered them unreasonable (such as attributing psychological problems and symptoms too much to "sexual instinct"), some of them did partially reflect the laws of human mental activity, such as the level of people's consciousness, there is a "subconscious" level that is difficult for people to perceive; Another example is that when individuals develop anxiety, they will develop some "psychological defense mechanisms" to relieve inner anxiety.
These psychological theories may have been realized by some people before Freud, but no one has put forward a relatively complete and huge system like Freud, and basically achieved self-justification, not only applied in psychiatric psychology, but also disseminated through a large number of works.
So, does psychoanalytic therapy have a positive effect on people with psychological problems or even mental disorders? On the whole, the effect is there.
If the client believes in the theory of the psychoanalytic school, thinks it makes sense, and has some positive insights in communication with the psychoanalyst, it is indeed helpful to alleviate the psychiatric problem.
In the 20th century, when psychological counseling/psychotherapy was still very backward, the psychoanalytic school was able to produce such a positive effect, and it can be said that it was the only one at that time. Moreover, after Freud, the genre continued to evolve, refined, and adapted to the trend of the times, developing shorter, faster-acting branch genres.
Until now, the psychoanalytic school still has some significance in psychological counseling/psychotherapy.
As we have said in the article before, at present, psychoanalytic therapy is more suitable for adults with relatively good financial ability, abundant time, and less urgent practical problems, especially adult women who are more interested in literature and philosophical ideas and more emotional, and this part of the people is often more likely to get some inspiration and thinking from the psychoanalytic school, and can also make this school play its meaning and value.
From the above point of view, it is an ironclad fact that the psychoanalytic school has a great contribution to the history of psychology, and one that we never need to doubt.
02. From a modern point of view, psychoanalysis has great limitations
However, in the context of the 20s of the 21st century, especially from the perspective of precise psychopsychology, the limitations of the psychoanalytic school are very large.
First of all, the psychoanalytic school has never been a science and has never been recognized by scientific psychology. As mentioned above, Freud was nominated for the Nobel Prize several times, but never won the prize each time. There is information that this is because there were many scientists at that time, such as Albert Einstein, who believed that the doctrine of psychoanalysis could not be verified and falsified, and that it could justify itself no matter what, and that it was not a science at all.
Sigmund Freud is said to have written a letter to Einstein saying that Einstein was "one of the lucky ones". Einstein was puzzled and wrote back asking why. Freud wrote again to explain: In the physics you are good at, ordinary people can't talk about it at all, but in my discipline, anyone can comment on it, aren't you the lucky one?
I don't know if this little story is true or not, if it is true, I am afraid that Freud also knew that there was a big "loophole" in his theory at that time - this theory was expounded by his own mouth and a pen, and could not be verified by scientific methods and confirmed to the public. Those who believe take it as a guide, but those who do not believe can easily find reasons to refute it.
Of course, human mental activity is inherently invisible and intangible, and even if the psychoanalytic school cannot be scientifically confirmed, it does not mean that it is completely wrong. In fact, the more critical reason why it has been widely questioned and even abandoned by many people is that it is ineffective in psychological counseling/psychotherapy, and it is difficult to solve the client's immediate psychological problems or symptoms.
We've elaborated on this many times before. Zeng Qifeng, a top psychoanalyst in China, is very frank, he said that the biggest role of psychoanalysis is to let the client know "why he is like this", as for how to change the status quo? How to solve the problem? Psychoanalysis does not give a good answer.
He also said that many people feel that psychoanalysis is very helpful for the improvement of personality, but it is normal for this to require 300, 500 or even more psychoanalytic treatments, which can last for several years, or even more than ten years.
Zhang Daolong, a Chinese-American psychiatrist and Chinese translator of DSM-5, also publicly said that in the United States, psychoanalysis was once a household name, but it has declined in recent years, with a usage rate of less than 5%.
He said that when he went to China for exchanges, he was surprised to find that there are still many people in China who use psychoanalysis for "such long-term therapy." The "long-term therapy" that Zhang Daolong is talking about here is actually another expression of "slow effect".
Zeng Qifeng is a top psychoanalyst in China, and Zhang Daolong is a psychiatrist in the United States.
I have been engaged in the clinical diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders for 20 years, and when I first started to study psychology, I also thought that psychoanalysis was the most authoritative.
At that time, I felt firsthand the inefficiency of the genre. Many patients do not understand the obscure terminology of the psychoanalytic school. Even if they have a certain understanding and agree, they will not be able to eliminate the clinical symptoms well.
Am I going to ask my patients to undergo psychoanalysis for years? I don't agree, this is also very unrealistic, most patients and their families who are seriously ill want to quickly eliminate their symptoms and return to social functioning. I'm always looking for more efficient treatments that can really help patients recover faster.
So, I gave up studying and using psychoanalysis, and I didn't think about it as deeply as I do now, but I simply felt that it was too slow to work.
In fact, Freud had the opportunity to create a more efficient and in-depth school of psychotherapy. He studied hypnosis, and in his early years, he devoted himself to using hypnosis to make patients recall forgotten traumatic events. He once believed that women's "hysteria" was caused by traumatic events.
Freud didn't realize at the time that he was very close to discovering the level of implicit memories and deeply repairing superimposed psychological wounds.
Unfortunately, later for some reasons, some books said that it was because his hypnotic technique was not as good as that of his competitors, and the hypnotic effect was not good; Some say that his later thinking changed, believing that the true face of the subconscious could not be well presented in the hypnotic state, so he abandoned hypnosis and founded psychoanalysis instead, and replaced hypnosis with "free association".
From the perspective of psychiatric precision psychology, Freud gave up the deep cultivation of hypnosis, which is equivalent to giving up the opportunity to go deep into people's implicit memory, which is a pity.
If we look at a deeper level and a more specific social background, psychoanalytic theory actually conflicts greatly with the Chinese cultural background. The philosophical foundation of the psychoanalytic school is "the inherent evil of sex", but in Chinese society and culture, most people recognize the "inherent goodness of nature", and there is a great conflict between the two.
Therefore, for some parents' improper family education methods, such as being too strict, taking care of everything, and disrespecting children, many psychoanalysts will think that these parents are trying to satisfy their own "desire for control". But in fact, this is very inconsistent with the real starting point of most Chinese parents. Such an interpretation of the psychoanalytic school is prone to worsening the parent-child relationship and is not conducive to resolving the conflict between parents and children.
03. If the psychoanalytic school does not know how to keep pace with the times, it will become non-mainstream
With the development of the times, especially the advent of the AI era, the disadvantages of the psychoanalytic school will be further revealed. The wind of its decline in the developed countries of the West will surely blow in the end in China.
The psychoanalytic school believes that it takes years, decades, or even a lifetime to perfect the personality. However, after entering the era of precision psychiatric psychology, clinical precision psychological intervention can go deep into the implicit level of people, find and repair the pathological memory behind personality abnormalities, and personality problems and personality defects can be quickly reversed, because it is deep and accurate, so it is very efficient.
From this point of view, "the country is easy to change, and the nature is more transferable", the long-term school of psychotherapy will gradually withdraw from the stage of history, and people can be more deeply aware of how their own personality and psychological problems are formed, and there is no need to rely on hypotheses and speculation.
Moreover, precision mental psychology belongs to the category of scientific psychology, and its core psychological theories "pathological memory", "memory reconsolidation", "implicit memory and explicit memory", etc., are all research results of scientific psychology in recent years.
For example, in the past 10 years, Lu Lin, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in mainland China and a leader in the domestic psychiatric discipline, has led a team to show through experiments that addictive substances can lead to strong and long-lasting pathological memories, causing patients to have a strong psychological craving and can't help but relapse; Human beings will also have strong and long-lasting pathological emotional memories after encountering catastrophic events, which will bring great pain to people, causing PTSD, anxiety and depression, and so on.
However, this part of the experiment is mainly concentrated in animal experimental models, and it has only developed into clinical trials in recent years. As for memory reconsolidation, implicit memory and explicit memory, there have been relevant scientific research results at home and abroad for a long time.
In the process of technological development and continuous clinical exploration, it has accidentally entered the era of precision psychiatric psychology, and has made a major breakthrough in the exploration of the causes of depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and efficient rehabilitation.
Therefore, some netizens feel that clinical precision psychological intervention technology seems to have suddenly emerged, but it is not. It also appeared gradually, and was based on new discoveries of scientific psychology about memory.
Historically, Freud and Einstein lived in the same era, and the two even communicated privately and had a good conversation. In the past, the two of them once represented the pinnacle of human beings in the fields of physics and psychology, and both had a great impact on future generations.
However, just as Einstein had limitations and even made mistakes (such as the negation of quantum mechanics), Freud had his limitations and mistakes. If the psychoanalytic school continues to use core theories and techniques, no matter how much it develops, it is destined to become non-mainstream. It is hoped that more people, especially those who are interested in and in need of spiritual psychology, will be aware of this trend.
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