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Digitalizing Psychoanalysis
Continued fr om pa ge I
There are innu-
merab le physica l
gestures and rit-
uals around buy-
ing ,open ing, and
reading a book.
An encounter
with a book can
be a full -bod ied
experience--tac -
tile in feeling its
weight and tex-
ture, smell of the newly printed page, sight in
the texture of the page and style of the print,
cradling the book to read it in our favorite
chair. The rituals and gestures around the act
of readin g place one, according to B irkerts, in
a s tate of reading. He w rites, I value the s tate
a book puts me in more than I value the spe-
cific contents.
It is not a long shot to suspect that such
p hysical rituals can influence th e subjective
im pact of the book. Cognitive scientists and
linguists are com ing to a new appreciation of
Freud s body ego in their recent emphasis on
embodied cognition. T his is an appreciation
that the experience of the body in motion and
the body s encounter w ith the world s tructure
the way we think and the metaphors and
language through which we conceive of our-
selves and the world. There is evidence that
the inf lu ence o f th e body and physica l c on tex t
is not lim ited to early developm ent but has an
ongoing in fluence on the s tructure o f th inking .
Jose A. Saporta
Theories of embodied cognition add a di-
mension to conceptualizing the differences
between p sychoanalys is and p sychothe rapy ,
in w hich physical context, physical rituals,
and different boundaries of physical space
m ay be significant to the experiences of each
t rea tmen t modal ity.
CONSULT ING ROOM
OR COMPUTER SCREEN
One can imagine that psychotherapy and
p sychoana ly sis af fe ct the s truc tu re o f sub jec -
t iv ity in par t through repea ted physica lgestures
and rituals and physical s pace. We see, smell,
and feel as we approach the office. We are
greeted and cross the threshold and enter
sound and sight are digitalized as opposed t
analogical. Voices com e over the speakers
w ith a slight, s ubtle lag between movement o
the lips and the matching sound. I h ave noticed
that on SKYPE o ne is unable to maintain ey
contact. To appear to the other person as
you are looking them in the eye you have t
look into the camera, which is just above th
screen. You cannot look at the person and
h is o r her eye s s imul ta neou sly.
What does one lose over the computer
that is a vailable when we share the s ame spac
in an office? Is attachm ent the sam e withou
physical presence? Is affective information
equally available? Are we present to each
other and to the experience in t he same way
Physical contact is possible but proscribed in the actual
office, but not physically possible in virtual space. Does this
not alter the experience of the wish and its modulation?
the space using our legs, and sit or lie down in
the way we have done innumerable times
before in that space and in other spaces in
our lives and our past. The physical space is
bounded. It is t he therapist s space we come
into, and we experience that space through
all of our senses. This physicality and bodily
encounter w ith the space is the background
for wha t t ranspires a ffec tive ly and l ingu is tica lly
between therapist and patient.
Now consider patient and therapist going
to separate computers and turning them on.
Rather than walking to the door and crossing
the threshold we
type instruc tions
on a keyboard or
c li ck a mouse . The
spa ce i s bounded
by a screen. The
patient does not
enter the phys ical
space of the ther-
apist but stays in
his or her own
usual sur round-
ing s. Beyond con-
scious perception
is the fact that
W ould the sense of containment be the sam
with virtual boundaries as with the physica
boundaries of the office? Physical contact
possib le but p ro sc ribed in th e ac tu al o ff ic e, bu
not physically pos sible in virtual space. Doe
this not alter the experience of the wish an
it s modulat ion? The physical p re sence o f bot
parties presents the possibility of enacting
one s fantasies. The words may be the same
as well as most of the music, the nonverbal
dimensions of speech , an d body language. B
how do the d if ferences in phy sica l a nd sen sua
experience, ritual and boundary affect the
sub ject ive impac t of the conversat ion?
The encounter with the space in which psy
chotherapy takes place is not just physicall
immediate. In Cultur e a nd Huma n Develop
ment, cul tu ra l-deve lopmenta l psycholog is t
Jaan Vals in er descr ib es a cu ltural ly med iat ed
space where cultural meanings direct ou
attention and physical encounter with the
space. Valsiner writes:
We can talk about dem ands that the
meaningful nature of a particular
structured environment sets up for
persons feeling, thinking, and acting.
Continued on pa ge
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Let us call these settings semiotic
demand settings
(SDSs):human made
structures of everyday life, settings
where the properties of the objects
are codetermined by perceptual-
actional and cultural meanings-based
possibilities and expectations.
Understanding the role of the physicalspace
inwhich treatment takes place must include the
cultural meanings of the space and how
con-
nects with other culturally arranged spaces
and to the culture asa whole. The therapist s
office and the Intemet are very different cultural
spaces,or different semiotic demand settings,
with different relationshipsto the overall culture,
which guide attention and action or our
encounter with the space in different ways
and with different subjective consequences.
EXPANDING CONTEXTS
But perhaps I underest imate the power of
human identity and subjectivity to adapt and
cross into new and expanded media and con-
texts. Such is the view of philosopher and
physicianRayTallis.He reminds usthat in 1850
Wordsworth believed that includingillustrations
into written text in newspaperswould infantilize
usand, drive us backto caverned life sfirst rude
career.
According to Tallis,Worsdworth, ...
fe lt that the endless influx of news from daily
papers would incite usto a level of unbearable
over the last few decades has not
fundamentally altered the way we
relate to each other. Love, jealousy,
kindness, anxiety, hatred, ambition,
bitterness, joy,etc., still seem to have
a remarkable family resemblance to
the emotions people had in the
I930s. The low-grade bitchiness of
office politics may be conducted
more efficiently bye-mail, but its
essential character hasn t changed.
Teenagerscommunicating by mobile
phones and texts and chat rooms
and webcams still seem more like
teenagers than nodes in an elec-
tronic network. I have to admit a
little concem at what we might call
the e-ttenuation of life, whereby
people find it increasingly difficult to
be here now rather than dissipating
themselves into an endlesselectronic
elsewhere; but inner absence and
wool-gathering is not entirely new,
even if isnow electronically orches-
trated. Itjust becomes more publicly
visible.What s more, there issome-
thing reassuring about electronic
technology: Because it iswidely and
cheaply available and because it is
so smart, it allows us to be dumb,
and so compresses the differences
between people.
Theories of embodied cognition add a dimension to
conceptualizing the differences between psychoanalysis and
psychotherapy, in which physical context, physical rituals,
and different boundaries of physical space may be
significant to the experiences of each treatment modality.
restlessness. For Tallisit isthe rate of change
that isimportant and when gradual enough our
experience of self canappropriate ever-expand-
ingmediums, contexts, and spaces.In hisarticle
Enhancing Humanity published in Philosophy
Now, Talliswrites:
The dramatic electronificat ion of
everyday life that has taken place
Human identity begins by appropriating its
own body and, given time, can appropriate
expanding mediums and spaces. Tallis con-
cludes, The essence of human identity lies in
this continuing self-redefinition. And if we
remember that our identity and our freedom
lie in the intersection between our imper-
sonal but unique bodies and our personal
individual memories and shared cultural
awareness, it is difficult to worry about th
erosion of either our identity or our free
dom by technological advance.
I view psychoanalysis and psychoanalyti
psychotherapy as one way to preserve
human subjectivity and relatedness again
dehumanizing cultural forces. It would be
boon to cultures such as China s that ar
undergoing such massive and accelerated
change. But, does the Internet and digita
information dehumanize, or does it extend
the range of human relatedness? By usin
the Internet and video conferencing to offe
psychotherapy and psychoanalysis to mor
patients, does psychoanalytic psychotherapy
succumb to and even become an agent o
these dehumanizing, digital izing forces? O
will our essential humanity and the essenc
of the analytic encounter assert itself in ex
panded and more varied spaces?I would l ik
to say that we will see, but when we as ps
chotherapists enter and adapt to this new
space offered by the Internet our own sub
jectivity may changeaswell, so that we may b
unable to see its effect. We can see the effec
of this new space only from outside of
from our traditional space. I suppose we w
have to see as best we can.
* *
I thank Alan Pollockfor helpful comments.
~
Editor s Note: This artide, in abbreviated
form, wil lappear in FOCUS, the Boston
Psychoana lytic Society and Institute
newsletter.
THE AMERICAN PSYCHOANALYST Volume 42. No.2 Spring/Summer 2008