Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
[emphasis added]A century ago there occurred a peak of interest in dissociation and the dissociative disorders, then labeled hysteria. The most important scientific and clinical investigator of this subject was Pierre Janet (1859-1947)....The evolution of his dissociation theory and its major principles are traced throughout his writings. Janet's introduction of the term "subconscious" and his concept of the existence of consciousness outside of personal awareness are explained. The viability and relevance of dissociation as the underlying phenomenon in a wide range of disorders is presented....
Pierre Janet became France's most important student of dissociation and hysteria. At that time, hysteria included a broad range of disorders now categorized in the DSM-III-R (American Psychiatric Association, 1987) as dissociative, somatization, conversion, borderline personality, and post-traumatic stress disorders. Through extensive study, observation and experiments using hypnosis in the treatment of hysteria, Janet discovered that dissociation was the underlying characteristic mechanism present in each of these disorders.
[emphasis added]The authors review his investigations into the mental processes that transform traumatic experiences into psychopathology. Janet was the first to systematically study dissociation as the crucial psychological process with which the organism reacts to overwhelming experiences and show that traumatic memories may be expressed as sensory perceptions, affect states, and behavioral reenactments. Janet provided a broad framework that unifies into a larger perspective the various approaches to psychological functioning which have developed along independent lines in this century. Today his integrated approach may help clarify the interrelationships among such diverse topics as memory processes, state- dependent learning, dissociative reactions, and post-traumatic psychopathology.
[emphases added]Pierre Janet must rank with the handful of thinkers, including William James and Wilhelm Wundt, who established psychology as a discipline. Yet nowadays in Britain and America he is acknowledged merely as a contributor to early psychiatric studies of hysteria. Remarkably little is known of his ideas, although many of them have passed into common usage....[He] introduced, for the first time, terms and concepts such as dissociation, and narrowing of the field of consciousness, which are now in general use.
You should understand what is being discussed, before being so quick to insult it.Oh, good.
Psychobabble.
'
It is quite clear to me that a large percentage of Americans suffer from serious or severe mental disorders.
How to explain this situation?
The following is my modest effort to contribute to the understanding of this phenomenon.
.
Mental dissociation caused by trauma is much more common than most people -- including most doctors -- realize · · · particularly affecting Americans.According to a recent definition, "dissociation represents a process whereby certain mental functions which are ordinarily integrated with other functions...operate in a more compartmentalized or automatic way, usually outside the sphere of conscious awareness or memory recall." A similar description of dissociation was given by Pierre Janet a century ago. He was not the first to introduce this concept, but was its most important student. Janet's dissociation theory is once again receiving deserved attention. Because he focuses on the role of dissociation in traumatically induced disorders, Janet's theory is particularly relevant for research into traumatic stress. Janet commenced his studies of dissociation with observations of patients suffering from hysteria. In the late 19th century, hysteria was considered to be a broad class of mental disorders, which embraced conditions we now include under the dissociative disorders: somatization disorder, conversion disorder, borderline personality disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder. It was already well known that hysteria often followed stressful life events. It was Janet, however, who explored and described the role that dissociation plays in post-traumatic hysteria.
Mental dissociation caused by trauma is much more common than most people -- including most doctors -- realize · · · particularly affecting Americans.
Perhaps it is something that is true even of YOU ! · · ·
It is not "my theory." It is well established and well studied fact. If you wish to give it a name, call it the work of Pierre Janet and those who came after him.what is this great trauma that caused such fear in your theory?
[emphases added]Americans have the highest risk of developing bipolar disorder, according to a new study of 11 nations released Monday.
The study, appearing in the March issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, used surveys of more than 61,000 people. The U.S. has the highest lifetime bipolar rate at an estimated 4.4 percent --- India scored lowest at 0.1 percent.
In research sounding like the plot of a sci-fi film, a group of researchers believes it has found the gene which performs the role of memory extinction. The process, which occurs when new memories overwrite old ones, is being treated as the key to eventually being able to completely delete painful memories. The research could lead to medical advances and the successful treatment of those suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or sufferers tormented by earlier experiences.
Scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in America conducted the study. They say that if a way can be found to amplify the activity of the gene, known as Tet1, it could change lives. The research echoes the 2004 Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet film, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, in which memories are wiped. As part of their study, the researchers compared learning behaviour of mice with the Tet1 to mice who had their version of the gene inhibited, or as the scientists put it, "knocked out".
Both sets were trained to fear a certain cage by giving them a mild electric shock each time they were placed inside. Mice whose Tet1 was "knocked out" learned to associate the cage with the shock, just like the normal mice. But when the researchers put the mice back in the same cage without delivering the shock, the two groups behaved differently.
To the astonishment of scientists, mice with the Tet1 gene did not fear the cage, because their memory of being hurt had already been replaced by new information. But the knockout mice, whose memories were not replaced, were still traumatised by the experience. The research appears in a September issue of the journal Neuron.
Read more: Memories study uncovers gene link | News.com.au