Decathexis
In psychoanalysis, decathexis is the withdrawal of cathexis from an idea or instinctual object.[1]
Decathexis is the process of dis-investment of mental or emotional energy in a person, object, or idea.[2]
Narcissism[edit]
In narcissistic neurosis, cathexis is withdrawn from external instinctual objects (or rather their unconscious representations)[3] and turned on the ego – a process Freud highlighted in the Schreber case, and linked to the subject's ensuing megalomania.[4]
A similar decathexis of energy has been linked to the emergence of symptoms of hypochondriasis,[5] as well as of melancholia.[6]
André Green saw decathexis as the product of the death drive, blanking out the possibility of thinking by a process of what he called de-objectilizing.[7]
Grief[edit]
Decathexis of the lost person in grief was seen as a regular part of the mourning process by Freud, although later analysts have argued that such decathexis was rather the result of inhibited or partial mourning, not of successful mourning.[8]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^ Paul Denis, 'Decathexis'
- ^ Hall, Calvin S. A Primer of Freudian Psychology. New York: Mentor, 1954.
- ^ J-M Quinodoz, Reading Freud (2005) p. 145
- ^ Sigmund Freud, Case Histories II (PFL 9) p. 208-11
- ^ Otto Fenichel, The Psychoanalytic Theory of Neurosis (1946) p. 262
- ^ Sigmund Freud, On Metapsychology (PFL 11) p. 266-7
- ^ J-M Quinodoz, Reading Freud (2005) p. 134
- ^ Lora H. Tessman, The Analyst's Analyst Within (2003) p. 236-7