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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