Psychoanalysis on the Move

The Work of Joseph Sandler

Arnold M. Cooper, Peter Fonagy, Robert S. Wallerstein, Arnold M. Cooper, Peter Fonagy, Robert S. Wallerstein

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• Topic: Psychology
• eBook ISBN:
  9781134627097
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Peter Fonagy Winner of the 2010 Sigourney Award!

Joseph Sandler has been an important influence in psychoanalysis throughout the world during the latter part of the twentieth century, contributing to changing views on both psychoanalytic theory and technique. He has also been a bridging force in psychoanalysis, helping to close the gap between American ego psychologists, and British Kleinian and object relations theorists.

Psychoanalysis on the Move provides a comprehensive and accessible overview of Sandler's contribution to the development of psychoanalysis. The contributors trace the development of the main themes and achievements of Sandler's work, in particular his focus on combining psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice.

Timely and important, Psychoanalysis on the Move should make interesting reading for psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, and all those who wish to know more about one of the most creative figures in psychoanalysis of the past few decades.

1

Joseph Sandler’s Intellectual Contributions to Theoretical and Clinical Psychoanalysis

Peter Fonagy and Arnold M. Cooper

Introduction

Joseph Sandler¹ has been one of the most creative figures in the past several decades in bringing about what Ogden (1992) has termed a ‘quiet revolution’ in psychoanalytic theory. His contributions form a coherent progression of thought on psychoanalysis and the analytic process, and he has been a formative influence on psychoanalysis during the latter part of this century. His accomplishments reflect an almost unique capacity to combine empirical research skills with the highest order of understanding of psychoanalytic theory. In a long series of extraordinary papers, one can observe the evolution of his thinking, from his more traditional frame of reference arising from his analytic training to his complex integration of ego psychology and object relations theory, which has become increasingly dominant.

This intellectual odyssey has been characterized by a consistent methodological effort to keep theory tied to clinical activity. While all of us have paid lip service to the intimate relationship of theory and practice, it was Sandler who used the Hampstead Psychoanalytic Index as the framework for researching how psychoanalytic concepts apply to the clinical situation, in contrast to what we expect them to mean. As a result, he initiated a series of redefinitions and reconceptualizations of some of the basic building blocks of psychoanalysis. His training as an experimental psychologist, statistically sophisticated and familiar with psychological tests and rating scales, gave him a fresh perspective on traditional concepts, and he supported and altered them on the basis of empirical research. His immersion in child development at the Anna Freud Centre also influenced his intellectual development.

Sandler’s earliest published works, preceding his analytic training, focused on psychological topics ranging from Rorschach studies to statistical analysis. After graduating from analytic training in 1952 at the age of twenty-five, he wrote his first analytic paper to fulfil a membership requirement of the British Psycho-Analytical Society. Published in 1959 and now recognized as a classic, ‘The body as phallus: a patient’s fear of erection’ described the necessary conditions for psychological development and functioning that elicit anxiety when threatened. This was the first of an astonishing series of papers that has shaped the way psychoanalysts think, written, often with collaborators, over four decades.

The task of presenting the key components of Sandler’s psychoanalytic contributions in the space allotted for it in this volume requires a capacity for moulding and synthesizing psychoanalytic concepts and ideas that probably only Sandler himself possesses. Robert S.Wallerstein’s breathtaking perspective on the development of psychoanalysis over the past half-century provides an historical backdrop for Sandler’s evolving thought over the same period. Wallerstein identifies three major themes in his overview:

1. the increasing importance attributed to the analytic relationship, which has become equal to interpretation and insight as an agent of psychic change;
2. the increasing influence of object relations and other fresh perspectives challenging classical psychoanalytical concepts; and
3. the trend towards greater sensitivity in psychoanalysis to postmodern concepts of evidence where clinical data are no longer seen as isolated and independent from the person of the interpreter.

Our aim in this initial chapter is to highlight what may be Sandler’s most important and lasting contributions, to link these with the chapters in this volume, and to encourage the reader to pursue this rich vein of creative and scholarly work through our commentary and Sandler’s extensive bibliography.

Representation and Affects

The Representational World

The most important new psychoanalytic concept introduced by Sandler is his frame of reference for the representational world. Described fully in a paper coauthored with Bernard Rosenblatt (Sandler and Rosenblatt 1962), the representational world had earlier formed the background to his 1960 paper on the superego (Sandler 1960b) as well as others (e.g. Sandler 1962a). Sandler’s notion of a representational world concept is rooted, among others, in the work of Piaget (1936, 1937), Jacobson’s (1953a, 1953b, 1954a, 1954b, 1954c) concept of self-representation, and Head’s notion of body schema (1926). The representational world is one of a family of psychological models that came into their own with the cognitive revolution in psychology, spurred by the analogy between the human mind and digital computers, long after Sandler’s adoption of the concept. Consequent to the use of the mental representational concept in cognitive science, psychodynamically oriented psychologists, as well as psychoanalysts, have adopted Sandler’s notion as the dominant framework for the conceptualization of the internal representation of object relationships (e.g. Blatt and Behrends 1987; Bowlby 1973, 1980; Horowitz 1991; Kernberg 1976; Stern 1985; Stolorow and Atwood 1979; Westen 1991).

Sandler’s internal working model antedates but resembles Bowlby’s influential formulation. Both view relationship representations as consisting ‘in essence, of a set of expectations relating to the mother’s appearance and activities’ (Sandler 1960b:147). In Sandler’s (1962a) conceptualization, representations of self and other have a ‘shape’; they also have a critical affective component that assists in the organization and integration of sensations and perceptions arising out of interpersonal experience. Once a self-representation is formed, object representations can be established. Sandler’s metaphor links the representational model to structural theory: the ego is the theatre and representations are characters on the stage. We are aware of the characters enacting the drama, but remain blissfully ignorant of the essential props the theatre requires for staging the play.

Sandler found it necessary to introduce this idea in order to be able to update and clarify many basic concepts in psychoanalysis (see below). For example, the process of introjection of early childhood corresponds to a change in status of parent representations that does not involve a change in self-representation. Incorporation, on the other hand, implies a change in self-representation to resemble the perceived image of the object. Identification is a momentary fusion of self- and object representations that preserves their boundaries and separateness.² An instinctual wish may be seen as a temporary modification in the representation of the self or the object; conflict can result in the exclusion of these representations from consciousness. Defences rearrange the contents of the representational world (e.g. projection modifies the shape of the object representation to make it resemble the unconscious self-representation). Similarly, primary narcissism is the libidinal cathexis of the self-representation; object love is the transfer of this cathexis to the object representation. Secondary narcissism is the withdrawal of libidinal cathexis from the object representation now directed to the self-representation.

In these early papers, Sandler saw no inconsistency between the notion of the representational world and classical Freudian metapsychology: ‘It is an auxiliary way of looking at things, of pulling parts of the psychoanalytical model together’ (Sandler 1962a:98). In the introduction to From Safety to Superego, Sandler (1987a) referred to it as ‘a useful supplementary frame of reference’ (58). Notwithstanding his modesty, it is evident to all serious scholars that his meticulous, systematic development of the representational world framework, as introduced by Jacobson (1954c) in her paper on ‘Self and the object world’, was the bedrock of the ‘quiet revolution’ of psychoanalytic thought over the past quarter of a century.

The Concept of Feeling States

In two papers, on narcissism (Joffe and Sandler 1967) and on sublimation (Sandler and Joffe 1966), Sandler proposed a profound revision of psychoanalytic theory, placing feeling states rather than psychic energy at the centre of the psychoanalytic theory of motivation. His paper on the safety concept (1960a; see below) anticipated this innovation, but his earlier papers on narcissism and sublimation forcefully challenged many of the original assumptions of libido theory. Joffe and Sandler (1967) questioned the appropriateness of libido theory as an explanation for narcissism. In brief, they observed that libido theory and clinical observation appear to be at odds, in that secure individuals show love and concern for their objects while insecure ones show higher levels of self-interest and self-preoccupation.

As an alternative, Joffe and Sandler (1967) offered the representational world frame of reference with its focus on the representation of feeling states and values:

The clinical understanding of narcissism and its disorders should be explicitly oriented towards a conceptualisation in terms of a metapsychology of affects, attitudes, values and the ideational contents associated with these, from the standpoint of both present function and genetic development.

(Joffe and Sandler 1967:64)

Disorders of narcissism arise out of the mental pain associated with the discrepancy between the mental representation of the actual self of the moment and the representation of the ideal shape of the self.

Problems of self-esteem are higher-order derivatives of the basic affect of pain. The pain is constantly present but may be made more bearable by psychic techniques, such as by seeking narcissistic supplies, overcompensating in fantasy, and identifying with idealized and omnipotent figures. If these adaptive manoeuvres fail, a depressive reaction may develop. Feelings influence the values attached to mental representations; the value may be positive, negative, or both, but it is the feeling shape of the representations that is critical for narcissistic disorders.

In a similar vein, Sandler and Joffe (1966) took issue with the energy transformation theory of sublimation originally proposed by Hartmann et al. (1949). They showed that sublimation is not isomorphic with any skill or activity, but instead is motivated by feelings of pleasure evoked by the removal of the activity from the domain of crude, instinctual pleasures. The activity used for sublimation is endowed with feelings derived from gratifying object relationships where the activity is represented as part of the self, and the product or the tool is derived from the representation of the object. Sublimation evokes a relationship beyond the level of simple need satisfaction. In a later paper, Sandler (1976a) further clarified this concept by pointing out that sublimations are symbolic actualizations that are unconsciously understood by the individual.

These affect and representation models were initially integrated in an important paper on adaptation (Joffe and Sandler 1968). In it, the aim of all ego functioning was identified as the reduction of ‘conscious or unconscious representational discrepancy and through this...basic feeling state of wellbeing’ (451). Many applications of the concept of a motivational system based on feeling states were explored, and the concept of adaptation was reconsidered as ‘the relinquishing of ideals which are no longer appropriate to present reality’ (451).

In a chapter on the role of affect in psychoanalytic theory, Sandler (1972) put its motivational significance unequivocally: ‘while drives, needs, emotional forces, and other influences arising from within the body are highly important in determining behaviour, from the point of view of psychological functioning they exert their effect through changes in feeling’ (296). Sandler saw the entire ideational content of the experiential field as embedded within a matrix of feeling states that give direction to all adaptation.

Sandler’s emphasis on feeling states created a bridge between classical drive theories and object relations theories. A key point was his assumption that feeling states are subjective experiences representing a state of self in relation to another person. Many creative contributors to the study of object relationships, particularly early mother-infant interactions, have gone on to make extensive use of Sandler’s model (e.g. Emde 1988; Stern 1985) as an alternative to poorly fitting drive theory accounts.

In a 1978 lecture on ‘Unconscious wishes and human relationships’, Sandler made explicit his conviction that the wish is the basic unit of psychoanalytic discourse, whereas instincts and drives are basic psychological tendencies. In further papers (e.g. Sandler and Sandler 1978) the break with classical drive theory became explicit. The historical progression of his ideas was masterfully traced in a paper delivered in 1985 in New York (Sandler 1989).

The Superego, the Ego Ideal and the Ideal Self

In a critical and well-known paper, Sandler (1960b) introduced a radical revision of the concept of the superego. In introducing the ‘pre-autonomous superego schema’, altering classical Freudian formulations of the superego and Kleinian notions (e.g. Klein 1927, 1933, 1958), he explained how preoedipal children can develop moral object-related behaviour. More importantly, he showed that the superego contains approving and permissive, as well as prohibiting, features, by providing the child with a background feeling of being loved. Structuralization of the superego remains associated with the Oedipus complex, and implies the capacity to invoke these affective states without the supervision of the parental object.

As part of the processing of case material in the Hampstead Index, Sandler, with Alex Holder and Dale Meers (Sandler et al. 1963), uncovered major ambiguities in the concept of the ego ideal (e.g. a conscience, an ideal self-representation, ideal parental introjects). Applying the model of the representational world, they suggested that the ego ideal was a version of the self that had the desired shape of the self. This representation arose as a compromise between desired instinctual gratification and the child’s need to gain the love and approval of parents or introjects. The discrepancy between the self and the ideal self-representation was seen as inversely proportional to self-esteem. Shame, for example, could arise from a failure ‘to live up to ideal standards’ (ibid.: 157), whereas guilt arose out of a perceived difference between the ideal self and the self as dictated by introjects.

Pain and Depression

In two papers, Sandler and Joffe (1965b; Joffe and Sandler 1965) reconsidered depression from a representational world perspective. They argued that the term previously had been used imprecisely, without making the essential distinction between states of unhappiness and misery (pain) and depression as an affective response. They advanced the view that psychic pain may be understood as the discrepancy between an actual state of self, and an ideal or wished-for state based on memories or fantasies. This discrepancy was seen as the common ingredient in all forms of unpleasure, including anxiety. Aggression thus was a normal response to such discrepancy.

Developmentally, there is a movement towards the appreciation of reality that entails relinquishing previously enjoyed states of satisfaction. With developments then, the ideal state moves away from magical and omnipotent experiences towards an appreciation of reality—optimally with minimum pain. Giving up ideal states may be analogous to the process of mourning rather than depression. However, ideal states of well-being involve mental object representations. Loss of the object may be usefully translated, then, to mean loss of a state of self for which the object was a vehicle. Depressive responses may follow when the individual fails to respond to psychic pain with an adequate discharge of aggression. The adaptive response is individuation, a process of working through that involves abandoning the pursuit of lost ideal states and adopting new ones that are syntonic with reality, as well as with internal states. This process occurs throughout life, but is developmentally typical of particular stages determined by biology and culture.

The depressive response—capitulation in the face of pain—is the opposite of individuation; it is maladaptive in that it may dull psychic pain because of the associated inhibition but ‘it is not aimed at recovery’ (Joffe and Sandler 1965:423). Depression is thus a final common pathway to a wide range of influences that can include constitutional factors as well as environmental and intrapsychic ones.

The Background of Safety

In a 1959 presentation, Sandler (1960a) significantly expanded the motivational constructs available to psychoanalysts. He introduced the background of safety, a revolutionary concept that placed the operating principle of ego in a positive framework of trying to maximize safety or security rather than to avoid anxiety. Although Sandler recognized the inverse complementarity of anxiety and safety, he was able to show that the pursuit of safety is an overarching construct, compatible with instinct theory, that has the capacity to organize defences, perceptions and fantasies. In addition, Sandler reaffirmed the status of instinctual drives as ‘prime motivators of behaviour’ (365). Nevertheless, this concept provided a motivational framework far better articulated with the interpersonal object relations tradition than a simple drive theory model.

The clinical application of the concept was illustrated in Sandler’s (19...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Notes on contributors
• 1. Joseph Sandler’s intellectual contributions to theoretical and clinical psychoanalysis
• 2. A half-century perspective on psychoanalysis and psychotherapy: the historical context of Joseph Sandler’s contributions
• 3. Wish fulfilment and the mastery of trauma
• 4. Between the background of safety and the background of the uncanny in the context of social violence
• 5. Some reflections on the concept of enactment
• 6. Importance of narcissistic cathexes in the earliest aspects of the object relationship
• 7. What is an object? The role of perception
• 8. The representational world and the linguistic idiom
• 9. Internal objects: theoretical perimeter and clinical contour
• 10. Unconscious fantasy as an experience of action
• 11. Gender-dichotomous fantasies: their relationships to the inner and outer worlds
• 12. Acute and chronic countertransference reactions
• 13. Psychoanalysts’ theories
• 14. Psychoanalytic heuristics
• 15. The analyst’s vocabulary
• Index