A Revised Psychopathology of the Psychoses and Psychoneuroses

WITHIN recent years I have become increasingly interested in the problems presented by patients displaying schizoid tendencies to one degree or another; and I have devoted special attention to these problems.2 The result has been the emergence of a point of view which, if it proves to be well-founded, must necessarily have far-reaching implications both for psychiatry in general and for psychoanalysis in particular. My various findings and the conclusions to which they lead involve not only a considerable revision of prevailing ideas regarding the nature and ætiology of schizoid conditions, but also a considerable revision of ideas regarding the prevalence of schizoid processes and a corresponding change in current clinical conceptions of the various psychoneuroses and psychoses. My findings and conclusions also involve a recasting and reorientation of the libido theory together with a modification of various classical psychoanalytical concepts. For various reasons the present survey will be for the most part restricted to a consideration of the more general aspects of the point of view to which I have been led by the study of schizoid tendencies; but it may be stated at the outset that much of the argument which follows depends upon the conclusion,