Numero 1/2024
CHARACTER AND PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
BY G. FERRI[*] AND G. CIMINI[**]
Aquiles A. M. Paiva[x], Mary Jane A. Paiva[xx]
10.57613/SIAR56
From the development of the evolutive arrow of time[1] and the model of Contemporary Reichian Analysis, the second edition of Psychopathology and Character was born, with the inverted title Character and Psychopathology: Psychoanalysis in the Body and the Body in Psychoanalysis.
This book closely explores in a new way the bottom-up and top-down directions of revealing psychopathology, now considering the availability of the body. The title inversion represents a revolution in how we can look at psychopathology. Previously, psychopathology was seen from a top-down perspective. But if we follow a bottom-up direction in analysis, a negentropic[2], evolutive, and three-dimensional view allows us to comprehend the person’s character and psychopathology. When the limits of the trait of the character[3] and the limits of the passages between evolutionary phases[4] are overrun, then we have psychopathology. Specific psychopathology is rooted in a person’s biological and biographical history.
With the inclusion of corporeity, a complex systemic reading emerges in observing life and its complex systems. For example, in a 1999 scientific debate held in Valencia, Ferri argued that psychosis was at the 6th bodily level[5] (abdomen), the one of intrauterine life, but reflected on the 1st level (the eyes, ears, and nose) in the pre-frontal area through psychotic decompensation. This discovery blazed the trail towards a bottom-up direction of the evolution of living systems, allowing the analyst to observe from a different position considering the biological processes of life’s development.
Ferri states, “It is impossible to understand psychosis without considering the low primary relational reciprocity during the intrauterine time marked in the abdominal area, at the 6th level. That is the same area where the nuclei of the base of the encephalon[6] are connected, which is the ground over which the consciousness of the ego can collapse” (Ferri, 2014).
Several adaptive recombinations stratify from the body’s intelligence through the phylogenetic period, which then recapitulates in the ontogenetic period until it reaches the consciousness of the self. The body already exists before the mind is shaped; therefore, life emerges, at first, in a negentropic developmental movement from conception on.
By introducing the phylo- and ontogenetic arrow of time and the time factor, Ferri could observe life from the bottom-up evolutive direction. With this observation, we get a three-dimensional vision to read the psychopathology, the unconsciousness, and the depth of the relational history of one person’s whole life, from their intrauterine period until the here and now.
The body is a fundamental compass to help us avoid getting lost amidst the complexity of life. It has a precise code to allow us to enter into the building of our personality. The ontogenesis is read and sorted out in terms of character traits. Object relationships[7] imprint these incised marks along the arrow of time, bringing the relational patterns.
Cover of book "Character and psychopathology"
The phylo-ontogenetic and evolutive arrow of time identifies the ontogenetic evolutive phases of building our personality that has seven floors, seven bodily relational levels. They are our peripheral afferents that carry information to our central nervous system. We regard one’s personality as an entire building where we dwell in several apartments. These apartments may prove to be functional or dysfunctional. It is essential to see how we reside and how we move. Informative are the relational incised signs imprinted on the body (where), the evolutive phase of their occurrence (when), and the relational language of the character traits (how). Thus, we can see more precisely and appropriately the psychopathology or the symptom being updated. As we see psychopathology through this new paradigm, we will see its roots in the body. And the brain also belongs to the body.
Ferri writes confirmatively about the pivotal importance of the therapeutic setting[8] by introducing the analysis of the character of the relationship. From this point of observation, it is possible to reach aspects of pre-subjectivity and subjectivity existing in the here and now of the dyad analyzed-analyst. Therefore, it is possible to gather the intelligent meaning of the psycho-bodily narrative and the implied and explicit memory of their analytical, clinical, bodily, and relational history. Such a new paradigm allows us to reach the pre-subjective aspects from the inter-corporeity between the analyst and the analyzed in the therapeutic setting. Thus, we have come to the language of the traits. According to Ferri, traits share a deep dialogue among themselves, exchanging the implicit developmental requests that have been experienced throughout a person’s life story. In other words, an implicit trait request will elicit an implicit request trait response from the other person’s own history.
Contemporary Reichian Analysis differentiates by its complex, systemic reading and its three languages: verbal, bodily, and trait languages. This last one includes both the previous ones. The cultural and historical evolution of Contemporary Reichian Analysis starts at the fractal[9] of the analysis of the character, where W. Reich began to look to the system and not only to the symptom. Ferri has put together vegetotherapy of state from Reich and vegetotherapy of the relational bodily levels systematized by F. Navarro and O. Raknes and created vegetotherapy of the stages, traits, and relational bodily levels.
The language of traits reveals dialogues of the unconscious. It has pre-subjective and subjective aspects and reaches the 2nd brain directly and the limbic sub-system. It revolutionizes psychotherapy in the therapeutic setting once it includes the body and the relational style of both the analyst and the analyzed in the analysis.
The character is the imprinted sign of the relationships along the evolutive arrow of time. How we pass on information, communicate, and direct the progress of a relationship has to do with the combination of our character traits with our relational style.
This model reads the body in psychoanalysis and represents psychoanalysis in the body; it brings biology to psychoanalysis and collaborates with neuroscience with a bodily-psychoanalytical language.
The importance given to reviewing psychopathology and the unconscious via the clinical symptoms and the analytical history, together with the bodily code and the pivotal role of the therapeutic setting, represents a significant contribution to neuroscience. This review shows the author’s search for “better-fitting” psychotherapy and psychopathology, allowing a greater understanding of the implications of the counter-transference of traits and therapeutic bodily activations.
Therefore, from this point of view, psychopathology becomes more understandable, human, and intelligent. The inclusion of body, feeling, and relationship support the differential diagnosis of “When,” “How,” and “Where” of the psychopathology. We can see the imprinted signs from a person’s biological and biographic history and their corresponding relational and bodily levels.
We consider this book fundamental for a better understanding of psychopathology and the unconscious and their reflection on the rapid and intense changes imposed on us by the contemporary world.
The present book has been altered so that readers can better understand it. Still, it has preserved its original structure and the coherent, continuous learning process about psychopathology along the arrow of time.
When we add this complex systemic character-analytical model in psychotherapy, psychiatry, and psychopharmacotherapy, we will have better clarity, precision, and greater personalization of psychopathology. Therefore, we may make a better differential diagnosis to help prevent and treat mental health questions that are so necessary in the current times.
[1] The evolutive arrow of time is a concept in Contemporary Reichian Analysis that describes the total time of a person’s existence from conception onward. It considers the biological and biographical depth from both the phylogenetic and ontogenetic perspectives.
[2] Negentropy refers to a negative variation of entropy, which always moves towards greater orders of organization and developmental stratification from an original value. In Contemporary Reichian Analysis, entropy and negentropy can be represented by two opposite directions on the arrow of time, one moving towards entropic zero and the other moving towards an increase in negentropy – for example, from the birth of an individual, the origin of life, or the beginning of a relationship.
[3] Within each developmental stage, an imbricated set of behavioral patterns and modules are deposited that have been established by the relationships with specific partial objects. These result from each of our own life stories in a particular stage, and they define the trait patterns of our character.
[4] A developmental stage is the period of ontogenetic evolution in which the Self receives imprints from relationships with the partial objects of that time. The interval bounded by two transitions is biologically marked on the evolutive arrow of time.
[5] The relational bodily level is the somatic location associated with the time of that specific stage in which the imprints are recorded and where the peripheral and implicit memory of that particular character trait is deposited.
[6] Encephalon is the result of recapitulating the phylogenetic evolution within the ontogenetic process. It is the central interface where the imprintings from each stage’s partial object relationships arrive, penetrating from the periphery, and are deposited.
[7] Object Relations define the how of a subject’s relationship with their world, which is the complex result of their specific personality’s organization. In Reichian Analysis, the object, which may be partial or whole, is real. It is present in the biological-biographical person’s history and has marked a prototypical how of trait on the bodily level. It should be interpreted as an inter-relationship and reciprocity (excluding-including, persecutory-welcoming).
[8] The therapeutic setting allows for the relationship between the analyst and the analyzed. The relationship itself is a third presence – a responsive, third living force. It will create triangulation that can be expressed and will expand the dialogue to a trialogue.
[9] In the comple xity theory, a fractal is a form characterized by patterns that repeat themselves in different sizes. Besides being patterns, they are also functions that can be repeated, always similar to themselves on every scale. The continuum is possible because of the fractal, which we consider an “elevator of internal evolutive time.”
[*] Psychiatrist, psychotherapist analyst teacher, S.I.A.R. President, director of the Italian reichian school, director of the scientific board of the series CorporalMente of the Alpes publisher, member of the New York Academy of Sciences, Member of the International Scientific Committee of Body Psychotherapy. Questo indirizzo email è protetto dagli spambots. È necessario abilitare JavaScript per vederlo.. Professional address: Via Nazionale, 400, 64026 Roseto degli Abruzzi (TE).
[**] Psychiatrist and Psychotherapist, Academic training in Medicine at the University of Pisa. He has worked as the Director of the Mental Health Centre of the Psychiatric Unit in Giulianova (TE), Italy. Questo indirizzo email è protetto dagli spambots. È necessario abilitare JavaScript per vederlo.. Studio professionale: Via I. Nievo 33a 64021 Giulianova (TE).
[x]linical Psychologist, Body Psychotherapist, and Reichian Analyst
[xx]Clinical Psychologist, Body Psychotherapist, and Reichian Analyst