TOWARD PSYCHOANALYTIC RESEARCH ON UNCONSCIOUS PROCESSES

In psychoanalysis, research into unconscious processes comprises a topical programme that is open to new developments. This is consonant with the basic grounding of Freudian thought in a body-mind monism and a theory that embraces completion. In generating new developments, integration with the contributions of the sciences of the mind seems fundamental. At the same time we must pay attention to a compatibility between different scientific languages, offering to unpack the excess of metaphorization in psychoanalytic models. Changes in the unconscious will be reviewed and examined, and some of the main categories will be discussed: temporal stratification, dimensions of psychic depth, deterministic assumptions, and many deterministic categories of the unconscious. Finally, the operating models of primary and secondary processes will be compared with operating models of multiple memory systems, as derived from current neuro-psychological research, thereby elucidating points of convergence and divergence.