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Disorders of emotional containment and their somatic correlates. The protomental nature of addictions, self-harm and non-communicable diseases

dc.contributor.authorTorres, Nuno
dc.date.accessioned2012-08-08T14:02:10Z
dc.date.available2012-08-08T14:02:10Z
dc.date.issued2008
dc.descriptionTese de Doutoramento apresentada à University of Essex, Centre for Psychoanalytic Studiespor
dc.description.abstractThis study is concerned with the emotional nature of determined forms of illness which seem to be largely determined by stressful social conditions rather than as a consequence of primarily biologic and somatic factors, and have been identified with labels such as "diseases of comfort, lifestyle related diseases", "degenerative causes of death". The models we have for understanding the mechanisms by which human subjects are affected by social environment stresses are still tentative, although some of the diversity of the psychosocial factors is reasonably well established. This thesis is an exploration of the theories of Wilfred Bion, which offer an under-researched approach to the nature and origin of such conditions. I have chosen three of these conditions as the subject of this study -drug and alcohol dependence, self-harming behaviours and a certain set of psychosomatic conditions - to test whether predictions formulated from the hypotheses are supported by a set of empirical measures. The hypotheses are that a determined type of emotional containment mechanism can affect certain types of health outcomes via disturbing the natural expression of primitive emotional systems embedded in the human organism. These primitive emotional systems are known as basic assumptions or valencies and are of 3 main types: dependence, fight-flight and pairing A mixed research methodology combining qualitative and quantitative methods was used: A total of 377 participants were assessed, 65,5% of whom were suffering clinical conditions: psychosomatic conditions, addiction disorders and suicide attempts, while the rest of the subjects were non-clinical. The qualitative section comprised life-story interviews. In the quantitative section, two self-administered questionnaire instruments were used: 1) the Work-Group-Function ScaIes-1.02 to measure valencies, and 2) the Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20 to measure a cognitive deficit of emotional containment. Results are compatible with the hypothesis that the disorders under study are associated with similar emotional containment mechanisms, comprising of two main components in response to stressful interpersonal events: 1) A deficit in translating raw affects into words and symbolic elements 2) Oscillation between fragmented and rigid modes of emotional containment.por
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10400.12/1678
dc.language.isoengpor
dc.publisherUniversity of Essexpor
dc.subjectPsicanálisepor
dc.subjectPerturbaçõespor
dc.subjectStresspor
dc.subjectEmoçõespor
dc.subjectPsicossomáticapor
dc.subjectAlexitimiapor
dc.subjectAcontecimentos de vidapor
dc.subjectBionpor
dc.subjectInstrumentospor
dc.subjectSaúde mentalpor
dc.subjectPsicologia do desenvolvimentopor
dc.subjectPsychoanalysispor
dc.subjectDevelopment psychologypor
dc.subjectPsychossomatic disorderspor
dc.subjectStresspor
dc.subjectEmotionspor
dc.subjectPsychosomaticspor
dc.subjectAlexithymiapor
dc.subjectLife eventspor
dc.subjectInstrumentspor
dc.subjectMental healthpor
dc.subjectPsychoanalysispor
dc.titleDisorders of emotional containment and their somatic correlates. The protomental nature of addictions, self-harm and non-communicable diseasespor
dc.typedoctoral thesis
dspace.entity.typePublication
oaire.citation.conferencePlaceEssexpor
rcaap.rightsopenAccesspor
rcaap.typedoctoralThesispor

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