Actually, a number of people have attempted to reinterpret psychonalysis in more or less behaviorist terms. In the Soviet Union, Trotsky, who was certainly very much an admirer of Ivan Pavlov, also took an interest in Freud's work and suggested that Soviet psychologists might wish to find a way for understanding psychoanalysis in Pavlovian terms. In the US, the father of behaviorism, John B. Watson, while attacking Freud's mentalism suggested that many of his findings could be understood in terms of behavioral learning theory. Dollard and Miller as Rand points out attempted to reinterpret psychodynamic theory in terms of the behaviorism of Clark Hull, while Skinner similarly suggested ways for reinterpreting certain Freudian concepts in terms of his operant anaysis of behavior.
Jim F.
On Tue, 1 Apr 2003 13:04:35 -0500 "RE" <earnest at tallynet.com> writes:
> In the later 40s and early 50s there was an attempt by Dollard and
> Miller to
> render psychodynamic theory in just those terms. In the way you
> suggest it
> makes a lot of sense. However, because their effort was connected
> to the
> behaviorist aim of extirpating consciousness from psychology it
> ultimately
> suffered the same fate as behaviorism. Behaviorists were 'extreme'
> experimentalists who wanted to escape the methodological
> difficulities of
> relying on introspection into consciousness. As I noted in another
> post,
> most psychologists found it impossible to talk about behavioral
> choices
> without talking about reinforcement histories, which in turn obliged
> them to
> talk about such phenomena of consciousness as memories and internal
> representations of the individual's environment. In my opinion,
> those
> psychologists who still try to accomplish the behaviorist agenda are
> replacing an interest in understanding people with methodological
> fetishism,
> and they can't be taken seriously any longer.
>
> Randy
>
> ---- Original Message -----
> From: <loupaulsen at attbi.com>
> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, April 01, 2003 12:17 PM
> Subject: Psychodynamic Forgetting (was: Re: "Bad" Mothers: The
> Politics of
> Blame Re: Radio Doug
>
>
> : The other side of this: even if such 'forgetting' is due to
> software
> rather
> : than hardware (to the extent that this distinction makes sense),
> it seems
> to
> : me there are a lot of ways to explain it other than the
> 'psychodynamic'
> ways.
> : Just operant conditioning would do it, wouldn't it? - thinking
> about X
> causes
> : distress, you avoid doing things that cause you distress, so you
> think
> about X
> : less. This accounts for a hell of a lot of my own procrastination
> and
> : avoidance behavior, I can tell you. You can call that "crude
> protection
> of
> : the individual", but so is not touching hot stoves.
> :
> : lp
> : > There is a thing called short term memory loss. People who have
> : > brain damage often have it. So do people with fibromyalgia and
> other
> : > conditions. Lots of times people are not diagnosed with these
> : > conditions and they are sent to the shrink by their incompetent
> : > physicians who do not give a proper diagnosis. Short term memory
> loss
> : > is physiological in origin so I think you have to be careful
> here.
> : >
> : > Marta
> : >
> : > >On Mon, 31 Mar 2003, RE wrote:
> : > >
> : > >> In sessions
> : > >> I've had patients broach a difficult, important subject and
> then
> forget
> : > >> about what they had been talking about ten minutes later, or
> else
> forget
> : > >> about it by a session the next day, at the same time
> complaining of
> feeling
> : > >> "foggy-headed" and the like. To try to talk about this in
> any way
> other
> : > >> than repression -- out of control, motivated forgetting that
> crudely
> : > >> protects the individual -- is absurd. If it's hard to
> study, that
> doesn't
> : > >> mean it doesn't happen.
> : > >> Randy
> : > >>
> : > >
> : > >I agree. There is some pretty convincing research that
> supports your
> : > >observation that motivated forgetting is a common defense
> mechanism.
> : > >But this example is more the exception than the rule when it
> comes
> : > >to scientific tests of psychodynamic ideas.
> : > >
> : > >Miles
> : >
> : >
> : > --
> : > Marta Russell
> : > Los Angeles, CA
> : > http://www.disweb.org
> :
> :
>
>
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