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Heinz Kohut 1941 - England

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Self Psychology

While rejecting the primary importance of innate Freudian sexual drives in the organization of the human psyche, self psychology was the first major psychoanalytic movement in the United States to recognize the critical role of empathy in explaining human development and psychoanalytic change.  Since 1959 Kohut and followers have transformed the practice of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy by deepening the therapist's empathic attunement to the patient and describing fundamental human needs for healthy development, particularly idealizing, mirroring, and twinship (or "alterego") needs.  Kohut's work has developed into the study of selfobject experiences, experiences (usually with other people) that nourish the self and which define the experience of the self and self-esteem.  Healthy narcissism is the appearance of a strong, vital, cohesive self striving with ambition and ideals toward the full realization of a person's skills and talents.  Narcissism is the appearance of a weak, vulnerable self attempting to maintain self-cohesion and bolster self-esteem.  Freud's method of free association within the empathic ambience of the consulting room can eventually develop into the analyses of selfobject transferences.  Disruptions in this ambience are analyzed as empathic failures of the analyst and must result in a restoration of the empathic ambience in order for the analysis to proceed.  Repetitions of this disruption-restoration process allow a person's sense of self to change and develop in fundamental ways and define the psychoanalytic process.  Intersubjective systems theory is a major contemporary school growing from self psychology.  It is a two-person theory of psychology consistent with modern systems theory and self psychology.  http://www.selfpsychology.com/whatis.htm

Reading

• Kohut, H. (1959). Introspection, empathy, and psychoanalysis: an examination of the relationship between modes of observation and theory. in Kohut, H. (1978). The search for the self. NY: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1971). The analysis of the self. New York: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1973) The psychoanalyst in the community of scholars. Address given at the University of Cincinnati, 1973 on receiving an honorary degree of Doctor of Science, in Kohut, H. (1978). The search for the self. NY: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1977). The restoration of the self. New York: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1978a). The search for the analyst's self, in Kohut, H. (1978). The search for the self, selected writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978, Vol 2. New York: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1978b). The search for the self, selected writings of Heinz Kohut: 1950-1978, Vol 1 & 2. New York: International Universities Press.
• Kohut, H. (1980). Remarks on receiving the William A. Schonfeld Distinguished Service Award. Adolescent Psychiatry, 1980 (8), p.51-53.
• Kohut, H. (1982). Introspection, empathy, and the semicircle of mental health, in Lichtenberg, J. D., Bornstein, M. & Silver, D., (1984). Empathy I, Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.
• Kohut, H. (1984a). How does analysis cure? Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Kohut, H. (1984b). Self-psychology and the humanities. New York: Norton.

Writing available on the net

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The Self Psychology Web Site

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