The Interpreted world: Spinelli
Contents
Introduction 2
Chapter 1 An introduction to phenomenological theory 3
The origins of phenomenology 3
Transcendental and Existential phenomenology 3
The Problem of ‘Correct’ Interpretations of Reality 3
The “Raw” matter of reality 4
Chapter 2 The phenomenological method 5
The Method 5
Existential Phenomenology a Epoche 5
Existential Phenomenology b Description 5
Existential Phenomenology c Horizontalization 5
Phenomenological invariants 7
Figure\ground 7
Phenomenological psychology 7
Chapter 3 The perception of objects 7
3 approaches 7
Innate biases in perception: wholeness and organisation 8
The effects of previous experience in perception 9
Phenomenological Theory and Object Perception 10
Chapter 4 The perception of Others 10
We perceive others by: 11
The effects of central traits 11
Phenomenology and the Perception of Others 12
Chapter 5 The Perception of self 12
Physical body as interpreted 12
Self as fixed 13
Interactionist model of self 13
The Phenomenology of Psychologically Compelling Situations 14
The phenomenology of multiple personalities 15
The fiction of self 15
Memory and the phenomenological self 16
Chapter 6 Existential phenomenology 16
Existentials 18
Thrownness\choice 18
Meaning\Meaninglessness 19
Angst 19
Sartre as a phenomenologist of freedom. 19
Bad Faith 20
Buber 21
Chapter 7 Phenomenological research 21
Chapter 8 Existential Psychotherapy 21
Yalom death anxiety 24
Ontological insecurity 24
Chapter 9 Phenomenological and humanistic psychologies: similarities and contrasts 27
Central tenets of humanistic psychology 27
Chapter 10 Phenomenology and the Major Systems in Psychology 28
Chapter 11 A Critical Overview of Phenomenological Psychology 29
Introduction
No study of consciousness in psychology apart from
phenomenologists. Sought to show how there is no objective reality but rather
consciousness is an interpretation. So, consciousness was studied to see how it
interferes with study of objective reality.
Transcendental phenomenology=Husserl, to the thing itself,
stripped of interpretation and effects of consciousness. Answers what is this
thing
Existential phenomenology=exploration of the poles of human
freedoms and limitations as being in the world (Heidegger). Answers what is
being
Is there a tension in a phenomenological engagement as it
seeks to look at the parts of experience against the totality of experience.
So, you might understand more about this moment by
describing in more detail some part of it, for instance as you look from the
café you might ask for a description of what is seen and more detail comes to
light, how the waiter looks like he is moving more quickly than usual, the
customer looks like they have a burden on their shoulders.
Do you lose in this drilling down the totality of this
experience? As you drill down, should you always come back to get that overall
sense of looking from the café?
Chapter 1 An introduction to phenomenological
theory
Phenomenology questions the existence of objective reality to
clarify it and sees the human species as meaning making.
The origins of phenomenology
Originally phenomenon=appearance (as opposed to reality),
the world we experience is the experience of phenomena
Kant=phenomena\noumenal
Husserl =science of phenomena=rigorous ground for perception
and philosophy=phenomenological method
Transcendental and Existential phenomenology
Phenomenology is a method of understanding objects of experience
and removing our prejudice that we put on via our consciousness.
Transcendental phenomenology=Husserl, removing consciousness
from objective reality
Existential phenomenology=Heidegger
Transcendental phenomenology= Reality as shared
interpretation
The reality we have is the phenomenological interpretation
we have of the noumena.
As things are mostly socially constructed realities, e.g.
book\money, then if you are not in that society, you would notice a created
thing but not a book, or money.
The Problem of ‘Correct’ Interpretations of Reality
Reality as consensus of dominant culture. All species have
some shared invariant interpretations, object, causality, time\space, but this
still leaves them as interpretations. Correct=in this social milieu most people
(the dominant people) would define this as true.
Any behaviour that seems meaningless is disturbing to us.
You need meaning, interpretation to reduce the tension caused by something that
appears meaningless and significant. You might say the meaning is there, but I cannot
find it. Or for me there is no meaning, which gives it meaning.
(!) It is a strange argument, everything that isn’t
meaningful is painful, but because we describe it as without meaning therefore,
we have given it meaning, so we cannot do without meaning. A better argument
would be things we are interested in have meaning, although acid trips could be
an argument against that.
This treats meaning as black\white rather than on a
continuum.
Meaning goes with human creation. Random relation of objects
isn’t meaningful. Nature goes with function; the functions of rain are to ….
Meaning seems to be purposive; function seems to be consequential.
Our experience then seems an outcome of being humans, of our
social reality and of our personal reality. So, there is a meshing of
experience qua species, society and self.
Philosophers split into idealist’s vs empiricists, objective
mind vs objective world.
The “Raw” matter of reality
There is a physical reality which remains separate from our
consciousness, and which, in this sense, can be labelled objective reality.
Equally, however, we do not have direct access to that reality, nor can we, in
any sense, ever know it as it is. Science has its latest hypothesis, which will
change as it has always done. It is also tainted by human bias, humans sense
organ, so at most it could be objective for us, not all species.
This is Kants transcendental position, this is the
description of the noumena, but there is a large jump going on here, as all we
have is transcendence, there is a sense of givenness, not an objective reality
which brings us to a Cartesian position.
Contradicted by We have no idea whether ‘things in themselves’ truly exist. P15
Intentionality is the central term of phenomenology. It is a
stretching out of consciousness to something outside it.
Intentionality, noesis is the act noema is the referent, the
object. Things refer to other things. The word “book” refers to the thing book.
They wrap together and can’t be extracted, whenever I look
at an object, what that object is, is infused with how I am perceiving it,
which will include, my history, my desires and what the object is next to. The
noetic aspect will also be complex I am perceiving, judging, staring, I will
have emotions towards the thing, which again are complex and relate to my
values.
Humans are biased to thing-based interpretation. So, our
natural interpretation of sensory data is to make it as if it were a referent
to an object.
Through the term ‘intentionality’, then, phenomenologists
point out a basic invariant relationship that exists between the real world and
our conscious experience of it. Unable to bracket this relationship, we are
forced to acknowledge, through it, the undeniable role of interpretation that
lies at the heart of all our mental experience.
Again, this is Kant, he is pointing to the categories,
unity, causality etc.
So, the foundational rule of Transcendental Phenomenology is
a dualist split between subject and object, between signifier and sign.
Intentionality draws subject and object together, i.e. no experience makes
sense without both.
So, whilst there is invariant intra-species interpretation
of experience, there is of necessity, the noetic component that makes each
interpretation of experience unique.
Noematic is the thing pointed at, noesis is the act of
interpretation, and splits into a common shared interpretation and a unique
interpretation.
Chapter 2 The phenomenological method
Husserl wanted to strip away interpretations to get to the
thing itself, therapists want to make explicit interpretations, such that self-understanding
is improved. You can see your interpretation and therefore learn how you are;
you can also challenge your interpretation too.
The Method
Existential Phenomenology: Epoche
Bracket and open.
Bracket our assumptions and expectations, our prejudices,
and stay with the data. Be open to the data.
Total epoche is impossible.
Existential Phenomenology: Description
Describe do not explain.
Explain as theory or hypothesis. Explanation goes outside
what is given, it’s a hypothesis that would take a laboratory to justify it. Again,
stay with and be open to the data. Absolute description is impossible but there
is a continuum from description to explanation and indeed from concrete
descriptive to abstract explanatory.
Existential Phenomenology c Horizontalization
Avoid a hierarchy of importance. Each bit of experience
should be treated like parts of a giant jigsaw where all are important in
making the picture.
It’s impossible to be without assumption, expectation of
explanation, but it is possible to reduce the number of assumptions, there is a
continuum between concrete description and abstract theory. Again, this
continuum would be between the uniqueness of experience and the generality. The
generality of experience would be that which would be amenable to theory.
The phenomenological method seeks to avoid the imposing of
set beliefs, biases, explanatory theories and hypotheses upon our experience
either at the very start of any examination or before it becomes useful to do
so.
Client’s experience is a giant jigsaw where you don’t know
the picture. When you have the data then you can draw a conclusion, an
explanation.
So, there are limits on phenomenology.
We at some point stop equalizing, we at some point make a
theory.
Phenomenology in psychology is useful as we confound the
event with the interpretation of the event and consider in a unitary event, we
don’t consider how we interpret.
You can only describe an event after it has happened, so now
it is ineffable. You might describe the
difference between a straightforward experience and a reflexive experience.
Straightforward versus Reflective Experience
Straight forward experience is action based, it is the
activity of experience as it occurs (which includes action-based interpretation,
there is time in it, as action has a sequence a before and an intended after).
Straightforward experience is the knowledge of the body.
Reflexive experience is that of the mind, its where meaning
and temporality come in and where we look to explain. In reflective experience
we can only communicate a small aspect of straight forward experience.
Assumption I must exist to have experience, as that’s how
language is constructed, I am feeling x. However, the I only appears in many
experiences once the experience has been completed. In intense or repetitive
actions where focus is on the action there doesn’t appear to be an I at all,
all there is, is a sense of doing.
The times we find are most vital; we are minimally aware of
ourselves. It’s only when we return to give a description or meaning to the
experience that the I return. Husserl
argues that self-consciousness is the basis of reflective experience.
Doing is present experience. It is ineffable, you have to
stop doing it to describe it. To describe what has happened, we are
reflectively describing.
Reflective experience allows us to communicate only a minute
part of the sum total of any experience.
Attention is the opposite, generally, of equalisation.
Attention, generally, has a hierarchy of significance, and pays attention to
what it thinks is the most significant, and ignores everything else.
Given language and its subject predicate structure, this
leads to an assumption in perception that there is an I, a subject that exists
prior to perception, which is what has perception. But many times, in intense,
repetitive, absorbing activity there is no awareness of me. It is only
afterwards in reflection that we are aware of the I. The paradox is when we
feel most alive, we are least unaware of ourselves.
So, in straightforward experience there is no I (rather
there is consciousness in the objects, so the tennis ball is the thing that I
can see I can hit down the tramline, because I am playing tennis) Its almost as
if there is awareness, without self-awareness, the self is split amongst all
the figure\ground.
I is the product of reflective awareness as is the not I
(you).
So, there’s a doing in the world, where I am lost, and all
you have is an instrumentality connected with a purpose, that you enter into
this world. I want to make a cup of tea; I can get absorbed in this where I
forget the world of I and anything outside the world of tea-instrumentality. It’s
like we both live in the lebensworld and the object world of reflection. I
construct me and you from reflection but we both live in the lebensworld of
doing.
It is only when we reflect and make sense (objectify) that
the self takes centre stage and appears the originator of experience. Phenomenology
questions independent objects as they are only created in the reflected consciousness.
Feels like he moves between Transcendental Phenomenology and
Existential Phenomenology here, we are all beings in the world, we all share
intentionally derived constructs, within a shared but also unique
interpretation. Each has a basis in material reality (Kant).
I can only define myself by comparing myself against others.
So, I see the I and not I in other people to derivatively work out myself
(mirror self).
So, in terms of polarity, I and you are joined, I only get
to define one in terms of the other, and of course vice versa.
I guess this also relates to relational frame theory,
whereby I understand things relatively, brighter than etc. I need the other to
define myself.
Greenberg and Michell argue we start off in an
unself-conscious world where there is no split between I and not I and then
through the defensive (?) development leads to I and not I.
Phenomenological invariants
Figure ground, intentionality (noema, noesis),
temporality/spatiality (thanks Kant), care (thanks Heidegger), thingness
(thanks Newton, Descartes)
Figure\ground
(MP) Transcendental Phenomenology aims to find the shared
invariants to experiences (IK categories), such that we can find the limits of
experience.
Phenomenological psychology
This is applying the phenomenological method to an individual’s
experience such that they can see their experience more systematically observed
and remove their habitual\temporal bias of interpretation. Its aim is to reduce
the biases within other psychological approaches. To remove bias, theory from
experience, to show the experience as purely as possible.
Chapter 3 The perception of objects
3 approaches
1.
Stimulus
2.
Gestalt
3.
Inference
Stimulus : unique
perception, unique stimulus. There is a physiological basis for every
perceptual act, with no intervening mental variables.
Gestalt: emphasises innate properties in perception. Shows
that the whole of an organisational unit of perception, is experienced
differently from the parts and that there is an innate sense of experience of
these organisational units.
Inference: applies empiricist perspective to perception, we
receive stimulus from out there, from the object, however studies show we are
not passive and associative, but rather also predictive and inferential, and
projective! Our mind as a blank slate which receives, impression from the world
(Locke\Hume). Empiricists=passive reception of perception on the blank slate of
the mind.
Mind with innate properties.
Descartes: form and size, amongst others
Kant: Space\Time and the categories
Sensation\perception
Some see reflexive sensation as not having anything else
mediating the action, the external stimuli create the reflex response without any
other event. Others see sensation as the singular movement from receptor to
cortical, whereas perception has many inputs.
Stimulus school is weakened by flashing letters up test for
very small amounts of time, they did this in different areas, and there was
repeated outcome that one area, top left was better read than any other, the
stimulus theory would say it would be bottom right. Top left made sense as that is the way that English is read,
they confirmed this with Hebrew speakers who read right to left. Likewise, the same stimulus can give rise to
different experience, i.e. the vase\face. But this shows there is a something
between the sensation and perception.
Brightness constancy, the more light is reflected is what
determines an objects colour, all light of spectrum=white, none=black, but a
lump of coal in sun reflects brighter than a piece of paper but yet is black,
likewise in different shades of light, bright, dark, darker a piece of white
paper still looks white. Could this be the difference between quantity and
quality, so brightness is quantity, colour is the range of colours on the
spectrum that are reflected. Context also plays a part here, as coal is
reflecting less than the items around it.
I don’t understand the brightness constancy argument. As I
understand it an object is red as it absorbs all light waves apart from those
on the “red” wavelength. White reflects all, black reflects none. If I increase
the amount of light on a white object then it’s going to reflect all this,
again, if I reduce it then it’s going to reflect all this too, so it’s still
going to be white, not another colour which would require it to absorb all but
that colour.
Innate biases in perception: wholeness and
organisation
A challenge on gestalt?
Do we have a species based, shared way of interpreting?
We unify sensations into objects=trees, cups of tea, are
composed of parts but we see the whole on the basis of our utility.
Dr P: case from Oliver Sacks, can perceive parts, not
wholes, concrete not abstraction, a glove= a continuous surface with 5 outing
pouches
We perceive in terms of meaning, and in organisational
wholes. Gestalt argues that we tend to perceive on similarity, continuity,
proximity and closure.
3 basic types of organisations of perception.
1.
Form
a.
Shape
2.
Depth
a.
3 dimensions
3.
Constancies
a.
Stability of perception even though things
change, a cat is still a cat, even with its hair shaved.
Some evidence that form perception is innate as 3-day old
chicks peck at round things.
That there exist a few important innate factors in human
perception seems beyond doubt. However, it would be wrong to conclude, as did
the Gestalt school, that the basis for all perceptual processing is innate.
Experience, too, plays a major role in human perception.
The effects of previous experience in perception
Any sensation we hear, we immediately associate it with
something familiar (we like meaningful\familiar.) If we repeatedly interpret in
the same way our interpretations become fixed\automatic.
Is the remembered past a determinant of perception?
Phenomenologists argue no saying it’s a determinant but not
the only one and also, it’s a remembered past, not an objective past.
Rather the perceived object is a result of
1.
The sensation
2.
The remembered past
3.
The context, the world\self
4.
Desires
5.
Prior experience
Enrichment
We first experience a sensation according to our innate
perceptual structure (and social context, and relationships e.g. Mum), we then
enrich this with past association, present context and future desire.
Perceptual set
We organise a perception via sensation which reminds of
previous experience which creates an expectation of the perception and enriches
the forming perception. The initial perception plus the previous experience
being a perceptual set. Perceptual context
affects perception; most clearly seem in ambiguous perceptions.
Phenomenological Theory and Object Perception
Perception directs attention (figure\ground). One of the
main purposes of the brain is to filter out other sensations, so we can focus
on what is significant to us.
First invariant=we interpret, Kants categories innate
perceptual schema
Second invariant=figure and ground, we focus our attention
on one figure amongst many, dependent on our desires/meaning. We need to bring
one thing into the foreground and leave other things in the background.
The more sedimented your view to something the stronger your
reaction to arguments against it\suggesting new possibilities.
Novelty which you produce come with excitement. Novelty from
others, may provoke anxiety, then after time passes, anxiety reduces they may
be accepted into a sedimented position.
Sedimented beliefs may provide the illusion of security, but
novel beliefs\interpretation are both creative and encourage the cultural and
personal advancement.
To see the possible interpretations of an experience you must
suspend your sedimented beliefs.
So, there is a noematic boundary, only those noetic
perceptions that fit within this boundary are accepted. There are some base
interpretations that are shared within society that again provide boundary but
within these limits there are a range of possibilities.
Two or limited interpretations are seen as natural,
extensions from there the result of an overactive imagination.
Difference in laboratory conditions and real life, is
objects in real life have emotional attachment and history. It seems then in real life that we think less
about an object the more we repeatedly use it in one way and define it in one
way. So standardly we are taught to understand and re-interpret objects in the
same way, sedimentation is our habitual existence, it is only when we have
breaks in this sedimentation that we can be creative and develop realisations
that can be mundane or startling. This would involve unique connections, of
bringing items in the ground and connecting to the figure.
Our ability to reinterpret experience allows us to get
closer to the experience of others, and to see how we interpret in the way that
we do.
Chapter 4 The perception of Others
As we look at someone, we form ideas about them, to judge
their motivations, personality, likes\dislikes.
All these ideas are generally not formed from the picture,
they don’t come from the senses, rather they are the result of perceptual
inferences from the observer.
We attempt to form a unified perception, a meaningful
perception of the other. Our main concern is that it is unified and
consistent/coherent, this helps us know what to expect from and how to act with
the person.
We perceive others by:
1.
Physicality
a.
Clothing (glasses=intelligent)
b.
Attractiveness: liked, well behaved=attractive
c.
Weight
2.
Demeanour
a.
Facial expression
b.
Possessions
c.
Names
d.
Non-verbal behaviour
3.
Our explanations
a.
Friend helping as kind or manipulative.
b.
Fundamental attribution error
i. Underestimate
situational factors over estimate dispositional factors.
4.
Social context
a.
If we expect to see a certain effect because of
the context, e.g. clinical interview, we will.
b.
We can also elicit what we expect to see, via
interaction. Projective Identification.
5.
Halo effect
a.
Judge a person as bad or good based on one
characteristic
6.
Personality
a.
Judging a person has a certain personality and based
on seen characteristics and pre-judging them on this basis for unseen characteristics.
Our first impressions of people are as powerful as they
are illogical. Our expectations can
also provoke that behaviour in another.
We tend to judge others in the same way as we judge
ourselves, self and other being the same judgement.
The effects of central traits
We can judge people as having a central trait, warmth or
coldness. These then are determinant in us creating an overall impression.
It looks like we want to understand people, so we grab onto
one aspect, the central trait, the halo effect and imply a whole bunch of
things that we can’t know. I guess as understanding means we can predict then
if we can predict we can control our likes and dislikes better.
The effects of first impressions are pronounced if you
aren’t phenomenological.
Criticism of many studies are they are static studies but in
reality, its interactive, you act with me who acts with you. I perceive you as
you are perceiving me, which reciprocally affects each perception.
Phenomenology and the Perception of Others
Shows that how we perceive the other is more about ourselves
and how we perceive than them. We meet new people, we are strongly influenced
in understanding them by how much they remind us of previous people, how they
fit with our understanding of the world. So, a new experience fits with an old
experience, so we understand the new experience in terms of the old, to give it
meaning. We assimilate and accommodate new experiences in terms of old ones.
Its comfortable we have coherence, there are no shocks in the world and its
easy, we don’t have to think too much!
We are highly determined in judging the other based on our
current affective state, our desires which then in turn affects our memories
that we judge them in terms of. There is quite a flexibility in terms of how we
judge the other person.
When we pay attention, we have filtered out all other
experience to pay attention to that. This is motivated by our present affect
that contains an echo from the past, our desires for the future and how we are feeling
in the present. We then interact on this basis and therefore affect how the
other reacts to us, sometimes provoking what we interpreted.
As I perceive the other, I do so based on paying attention
to them for a certain outcome, I have a desire from them, why do I perceive
them, what do I want from this person?
Perception is then motivated by desire. There is an
expectancy variable
We perceive based on familiar memories, future expectations,
current context and current desire
We perceive others based on how we are. But if 100 people
perceived in the same way, what would be saying, that the other is, or that we
have cultural accord.
We perceive the other differently dependent on how we are.
Couples counselling: a partner desires change the other partner sees them as a
different person , rather than
reinterpret them as they are with the new wish, the want them to go back to
being the same person and want to end the relationship as they have changed.
Fromm: we love in terms of ownership, the other as an object
we possess, when they don’t do what we want then rather than question our
assumptions we look to discard them. We love in terms of definitional and
behavioural control, what the other as an object, which is defined can do for
us. Rather than a subject who can make fresh choices. Such circumstances arise
when there is a hierarchy of self, where you must do for me.
If we take it that there is no fixedness in perception or
the other, then this can provoke anxiety.
Chapter 5 The Perception of self
We want to be unique, special, standing out for status and
awards, but doing this leads to isolation and loneliness.
Physical body as interpreted
Phantom limb /Losing sense in your body, your hand doesn’t
belong to you under certain medical conditions, e.g. stroke.
Self as fixed
Self as a fixed thing, an object, comprised of components.
James=what are those components=social, ideal, psychological
self.
From components of self to characteristics.
Self as originator of behaviour, restrictions of behavioural
freedom as highly unpleasant and values the restricted. People want to deny they are the originators
of behaviour when the results are unpleasant.
Continuum of belief about how strongly people believe what
they do affects what happens to them, or that what happens to them is a result
of external factors.
So, the idea is that the self is the thing that is
responsible for your behaviour, freewill, but what about advertising, what
about people who want to blame external circumstances for their actions (I was
forced), what about the readiness potential which is activated before you
believe you make the decision.
Interactionist model of self
Self is a result of interactions with others, we
compare\contrast ourselves with various reference groups.
Comparison to others motivated by self-aggrandizement for
people with low self-esteem.
Narrative view, self as the glue that makes sense of various
episode, self as what enables the storying of various events.
Relationally dependent self means self as impermanent
dependent on actions with others, so if everyone tells you that you’re great
your LSE improves.
Deception implies a real self, competing views of self stays
with the phenomena. We can act in ways that we don’t understand.
We have an invariant need to make meaning of the
meaningless. I need to understand why something happened.
Invariants of perception
Figure ground
Causality
Object
Space\Time
Kants categories
Self-consciousness
If we’re only aware of ourselves as a self, when we reflect,
then we will be intentionally engaged in a situation, with a past\present and
future, with an expectation from the situation. This self will be unique from
other selves, so we will be transient and fragmented, although of course we
might interpret the self in reflection, in the same way we perceive, and link
it to a past me.
The Phenomenology of Psychologically Compelling
Situations
Extreme situations, people change how they behave! What you
might expect of them
Definitions
Interoception, the feeling inside me
Proprioception, where my body is, my schema, my hands and
legs
Exteroception, my experience from the outside world
Husserl => self as result of experience not the
originator of it
Invariant 1: self as originator of action
Invariant 2: self-consciousness
Phenomenologists agree there is self-consciousness but not
that the self is permanent. This is
justified by proprioception, multiple personalities and compelling
psychological events.
Proprioception is the feeling we have of our bodies being ours
and where or body is. Strokes can wipe
out ownership of parts of body; phantom limbs can keep ownership of the body
when it has been lost.
If you lose proprioception, you lose the feeling that a part
of your body is yours. This shows your body is an interpretation. Likewise,
anorexics interpret their bodies incorrectly. Our body is what we believe it to be.
Our notion of self extends beyond our body, our car bumper,
when we hit something, we scrunch up our face, our tennis racquet.
Psychologically compelling situations, kidnap, riots, people
stop being their regular self. Zimbardo experiment with guards and prisoners.
The 2-week experiment was stopped after 6 days, severe depression, anxiety,
brutal behaviour, psychosomatic rashes.
Milligram and teaching via electric shocks, got people to do
enough to kill people because people were wearing a white coat. I did a
psychologically abnormal thing as I was told to.
In these extra ordinary situation’s participants blamed
external situation, if it was up to me, I wouldn’t have administered the shocks,
but I had to follow my instructions.
Phenomenological view of self gives interpretative meaning
to the chaos of experience, so varies over time but is stable at any given
time.
The self-construct is the emergent interpretative structure
that construes meaning from the chaos of experience, it is inherently
impermanent over time while still appearing to be stable at any given point in
time.
[Start Review]
The phenomenology of multiple personalities
Severe punishing moral upbringing, attempt to follow their
desire but not be plagued by guilt=disassociate=create separate character
Whilst DID create separate characters to do the unacceptable
and punishable things, we do the same, when we do something out of character,
we invoke external agency, substance, extreme emotion which compel us to act in
the way that we do. We
might also invoke memory lapses to reduce our guilt.
Basically, we have a range of acceptable personalities, when
our action falls outside of this, we create a disassociate explanation for it,
or an external explanation for it. I did it as I was drunk, stressed,
forced…etc
If you have personality dissonant behaviour, you can either
change yourself construct or make some understanding of the dissonant
behaviour. Whilst the former seems more truthful, the effects are much larger.
The fiction of self
Difficult to talk about non-permanent thing like self-construct
due to language, I am x.
If our self goes through continual revision, albeit having a
sense of stability at any point, how come we have a sense of self identity, of
continuity of the self through time.
Challenge to self as reinterpretation depending on
intentional variables as core self who remembers and gives the self a narrative
through time.
Contemporary theorists=sensory, short term and long-term
memory. Memory as encoding and recall. Based
on studies remembering letters, most memory is short and lost in a second.
Function of memory as remembering things that help our
survival, probably why experimental tests give the results they do. Likewise, memory doesn’t aim to reproduce
exactly, the sense of bear=bad is good enough.
Bergson=we can remember everything. Primary function of
brain is to stop us getting overloaded. So, we perceive\remember\imagine in
a hierarchy of importance
Brain filters out to stop us being overloaded,
perception, attention and memory.
Memory can be triggered by any of the senses; the content of
a memory can contain any of the senses.
Eidetic memory as a precursor to interpretative memory, as
it is seen in young people and declines with age. Problems we have with rote learning may be
because we rely on importance to generate memory.
Penfield=brain surgery, stimulate part of brain, provoked an
insignificant but eidetic memory, which seem to suggest that the brain has a
memory of everything and can under certain circumstances recall it. Critics say the memory could be fantasy, Penfield
showed this wasn’t the case.
Brain being damaged or electrically stimulated allowing
previously unremembered memories to return=>everything is stored, but only
the significant are recallable?
Memory and the phenomenological self
If we can remember everything, then how does this bear on us
making a unified narrative in memory of the self. If memory isn’t fixed, then
we draw our memory dependent on current significance which depends on
interpretation. So how we currently
interpret the world\ourselves then this leads to the memories we use to support
this. So, there isn’t a fixed self that memory represents. So, our memory can be used to validate our
current interpretation, or refine it, it is interactive.
The feelings of memories change over time, if you were
jilted as a kid, that would feel dreadful and likely to have different feelings
for it over the years. So, your interpretation changes.
The self is understood, in part, as all your memories of
yourself. Your current perception is enabled through your interpretation of
events in the world, that are understood in terms of their relation to previous
remembered events which are interpreted based on your current experience and
desires. This is a bit complicated and convoluted but seemingly true as well. I
think this is Hedegger ecstatic time.
Chapter 6 Existential phenomenology
Transcendental Phenomenology focuses on essence
Existential Phenomenology focus on existence, a practical
philosophy with social\policial\psychological aspects
Existence themes
·
Freedom
·
Care
·
Temporality
·
Others
·
Meaning
Roots of existential phenomenology
Kierkegaard and Nietzsche
Kierkegaard=we are free, it provokes anxiety; anxiety shows that we are
free and should be moved into
Nietzsche=we should create our own values and not follow the
herd
Heidegger took great pains to insist that like Being, Dasein
cannot ever be fully contained, captured, defined or objectified.
The ontological aspect refers to the universal ‘givens or
structures of Being; the ontic aspect refers to the specific and particular
means by which any universal given is expressed or embodied.
The ontological is expressed ontically, temporality is
expressed in this way by Dasein, or care that way, or being-with like this.
Neither of these guys sees the inter-relational aspect of
existence, it’s about individuals
They both thought it matters less what you believe, and more
how you believe it.
Heidegger.
Existentials=givens
Ontic=thing, particular instance
Ontological=Being, that things\people can be
Dasein is in a with world.
A particular reveals a universal, being=>Being
Ontological=temporality
Ontic=fear of death
Existential Phenomenology looks to understand the ontic in
relation to the ontological.
Humans exist, that is their being is of issue for them.
Humans can make things, e.g. computers, and give them being,
but humans are, and also what their being is, is a question for them, they are
a subject that can create themselves.
Being as the universality of being, of the existential
givens, of which being can be a manifestation.
Being as time, with Dasein of being with and in the world,
of having a world, of facing death.
With objects of being in a world of instrumentality.
Ontological is what enables the ontic. We can see objects
because of light, so to answer the question what enables existence that is the
ontological question, that used to be answered by God or spirit.
What allows this table to exist, or me and sure I made the
table but both of them exist as they can stand out of their background, so you
need a world and standing out.
Ontic, how do I express the temporal ontological aspect, it
might be in a fear of death, or procrastination.
Being is the condition of the possibility, what makes it
possible to have beings.
Understanding=descriptive
Explanation=causal
Authentic=owning my being
Inauthentic=disowning my being
It is a strange thing though, to own my being, as what it
means to be me is derived from my engagement with you.
We move between inauthentic and authentic states, they are impermanent,
indeed, to strive for authenticity would be inauthentic.
Authenticity and Inauthenticity
Heidegger’s word for authentic is better translated as
ownership or not owning.
If I open myself to my experience of existing, I own that
experience in that it expresses my particular way of engaging with Being.
This inauthentic way emerges when I cut myself off from my
engagement with Being
Inauthentic, I can live forever, time doesn’t affect me, I
have no choice, I don’t take my choice, I am grounded, there is solid meaning.
As inauthentic beings, we interpret ourselves as reactive
victims to experience.
Existentials
Thrownness and Choice
Temporality
Authentic\inauthentic
Angst\Anxiety
Groundlessness
Meaning\Meaninglessness
Thrownness\choice
We can choose how to live, in that we choose how to react,
give meaning to the things we experience.
It remains our choice to ascribe a particular meaning to any
behaviour. Sometimes, due to culture, there is only one choice, and I must
choose this. Then how am I with this, there is a sense of freewill to choose
meaning, but there is only one choice. What do you do, accept, rail against how
unfair it is, seek to create another meaning that no one else subscribes to.
On the other hand, what do you do where there is too much choice,
the food in the supermarket, 50 types of cereal, look for the best, look for
what you usually have, the advertised, or the first one?
Thrownness=no choice to come into existence at this place
and time, in this body. I do have choice in terms of how I react to my
thrownness.
Thrownness may dictate how something is interpreted. You may
have no choice to the meaning but how do you engage with that, are you angry,
accepting, do you believe it strongly\weakly. If you have no choice, do you
engage with the having no choice, or do you imagine that you could have had a
choice, if …
Meaning\Meaninglessness
We have a choice to what meaning we can give something, it
could be a choice of one, it could be more something I choose for myself, or
more something I think must happen, should happen so is less owned. I guess
there might be a choice of one, but how then do I engage with that meaning,
flippantly, comedically, insincerely etc.
Several factors determine how we interpret, so events are
interpretively open or meaningless. So, there is no absolute truth, no
objectivity. Meaning changes over time, it is not fixed.
The meaning I give to an event, depends on how I see myself
at the time, what projects I have. If my
cat dies, I might feel that I have been left by a loved one, or challenged to
tolerate the depth of pain, or moved to get another such cat, or to find other
such relationships in the world
The certainty of Existential Phenomenology are the
thrownness which we experience.
Existential Phenomenology believe that thrownness is the
source of all beliefs we may have about the world. (???!!!)
Angst
To be more authentic is to realise the unfixed, uncertain
and finite life (although we don’t know when it will end) and the emotional
relation to this is one of angst.
Authentic acceptance of uncertainty can be achieved via a
religious achievement, a drugs achievement through altered consciousness.
It’s a strong argument either you can accept uncertainty and
finitude, and you will feel angst and be authentic or you cannot accept then
and be inauthentic without angst.
So, to be certain avoids angst but at a cost.
If life must be meaningful, we need to avoid things that
cause doubt. If life needs to be certain we need to avoid things that cause
uncertainty. So, to avoid angst we become anxious in case we don’t avoid
certain things, so what does this mean? I must be successful so avoid things
that threaten that, be anxious if that isn’t the case. So, to have meaning and
no angst I need success but then become anxious if that isn’t the case.
So, the idea that to maintain a truth that isn’t: I could
publish a book, or that one of my truths e.g. you must be successful=, is
absolute, leads me to anxiety should this be threatened, and I avoid situations
that would provoke this, but the reason I have these inauthentic truths is to
protect me from the angst of meaninglessness.
Sartre as a phenomenologist of freedom.
Humans don’t possess freedom, they are freedom, any attempt
to avoid this leads to despair and anxiety. Man is a useless passion.
Conflict between the a priori indefinableness of being,
and the desire for humans to define it.
This is the conflict between being for itself and being in itself. Freedom
vs essence. Freedom transcends and is anguish as it loses substantive,
stable meaning.
Freedom is not at an event level, we cannot control events,
but we do control how we interpret them.
Being for itself
Transcends, is freedom is anguish loses meaning and
stability, it is without foundation.
Being in itself
Meaning is a property of this. Dogma, certainty, avoid angst
but connect to shame as we are not free. I think what he is talking about here,
is absolute meaning, fixed meaning, objective meaning, rather than transient,
the meaningful choice to me is x, could be y, but in this situation its x.
We are nothing pretending to be something.
Others:
I want to be a for itself, be free, transcend but so does
the other. Each wants to be the subject but to do that the other must become an
object. Sartre softens this to understand I as a not I, so I define myself in
terms of other people. So, we rely on others to make sense of ourselves, and
yet conflict is still the base relation of self to others.
Fundamental Christians and Islamists are in conflict because
of their shared assumptions about being right, deity, being religious
dogmatists. So, because they are in fundamental agreement, so they are in
conflict. So, there could be
co-operation through mutual recognition of inevitable conflict.
Bad Faith
Sartre though found no evidence of our being for others
relation, rather he saw more of bad faith. Bad faith where I treat myself as an
in itself, with musts\shoulds because I’m an x. Bad faith is avoiding taking
responsibility by claiming to be, or pretending to be a thing that doesn’t
chose. Bad faith as playing a role.
Could you ever be in good faith. Whatever I decide to do, I
have learnt from others, I have chosen and within this choice is a influence of
others. As soon as I start doing it,
digging the garden I am influenced by how I learnt from others how gardens can
be digged, I have no original action, my whole digging of the garden is
performed via a script from others. Bad faith seems an extent of degree, rather
than something that can be negated. But then bad faith is about not
acknowledging the choiceness of it, I can be a waiter but also, I could be in
good faith if I realise that I could be otherwise, so ironically, we can do
anything and be in good faith. He says surprisingly little about good faith,
and I wonder why that is.
Nausea
As the acknowledgement that we are responsible for all the
bad things we do, bad faith for instance.
By how much we restrict ourselves. Heidegger sees angst relating to
authenticity and Sartre sees nausea relating to bad faith
Challenge to love others as others, not as objects for you.
Does acting towards yourself as a subject make others
objects?
As a subject I can define values, I have decided it’s good
to wear pink and not work. As a subject we do what I say not what you say, so
you can’t act as a subject to me. I can of course be a subject without
subjecting you, I can react in ways that I want, but I don’t need to make
demands of you.
Buber
We become ourselves through relation
Difference between individual and person. Person, and
inseparable relationship to the world, a real relationship of reciprocity with
the world, in all the points it can meet. An individual is a disconnected
scientific unit.
I-it I can interpret you as a fixed object, a lazy person, a
person to serve me. I-it relation to the other, is about separateness,
objectification, judgement, manipulation and control.
I-Thou I engage with you dialogically where I see you as a
subject, a meaning creator and someone who engages with me as meaning creator
and given we are in relationship this meaning will happen between us as we are
flexible.
To practice I-Thou you must experience your relationship
both from your side, and from the others (inclusion).
Empathy as an ego centric explanation, rather than trying to
enter into otherness
In a I-it relationship, the I-it is merely a projection
of the I.
I thou, we are both meaning creators and meaning is created
in relation and we are in relation. So, in this relation then I both take my
perspective and I take yours. I respect
the other in their otherness
4 main themes of Existential Phenomenology
1.
Uncertainty in the face of a world with no fixed
meaning
2.
Freedom to choose action\belief in the face of a
meaningless situation
3.
Existential givens, we are constrained, by our
thrownness
4.
We cannot avoid being responsible
5.
The above 4 are grounded by inter-relationality
Chapter 7 Phenomenological research
Of no interest
Chapter 8 Existential Psychotherapy
Core features
1.
Humans develop meaning of their lived experience
2.
Meaning emerges from humans’ inter-relation with
the world
3.
As meaning is intentionally derived no meaning
can ever be complete
4.
To either accept there is no fixed meaning, or
to avoid this fact provokes anxiety.
5.
We are time limited in our meaning making
Existential therapy is not technique led, it is
understanding led and technique comes after that.
Existential therapy’s sees that what are standardly deemed
as disorders can often be the outcome of trying to avoid the angst of living
authentic lives in the face of their worldview.
Existential therapy as examining client’s life, way of
seeing themselves, their worldview, to enable them to live a life that is more
in tune with themselves and so they feel more alive.
Existential therapy sees a client’s problem as part of their
overall way of being in the world, so part of a wider problem.
Existential therapy seeks to clarify the world view of the
client
Existential therapy seeks to clarify the disowned
beliefs\behaviours etc.
One way to explore a client’s worldview is via Binswanger’s
umwelt, Mit welt and eigen welt
Physical world
With world
Personal world: the close relations we have with self and
others.
Van Deurzen: Uber welt: the ideological world
Spinelli: Inter-relational realms
I focused: my experience of being myself in relation: so,
beliefs, demands, motivations
You focussed: what beliefs, demands and motivations you put
on others
We focussed: how do you engage with what emerges between you,
it is immediacy with the therapist
They focussed: how do you engage with other relationships in
his life
Attuning to, staying with the client’s world view. Hearing
the other and allowing them to hear themselves.
This can allow the client to become aware of their sedimented stances to
self\world\other that may be causing their symptoms.
Existential therapy’s look at the what and how of the client
experience and not the whys.
Therapist originally means attendant, so a therapist should
be a specialist in awareness and attention.
Being with the client, accepting\respecting their world view
Being for the client, elucidating, describing their
assumptions, beliefs, rules for living, values and their corollary emotions. So,
their worldview of self\world\other, their meaning making apparatus. FM2, I
like that because of my worldview.
No explanations, no interpretations, just descriptions. But
connecting things is some explanation, if you don’t connect things don’t make
wholes and we think in wholes.
Have the integrity and the humility to allow a client to
arrive at their own ideas about how to live. (MP hopefully)
Not asking why questions, rather what and how, which touches
on the noematic, and noetic. Why is asking a causal question. What is asking a
descriptive question of the thing that’s intended, how is asking a descriptive
question of the relation to that thing. How are you eating that apple, lustily.
So, the arguments are the existential givens provoke
anxiety, which can be intolerable. The defences against these anxieties are the
symptoms clients want curing.
Existential givens
1.
Temporality
2.
Meaningless
3.
Freedom
4.
Isolation?
We are born and face certain existential givens: freedom (I
can react in any way), responsibility (I am responsible for my life), temporality
(we will die, my experience is temporal), meaninglessness (there is no
objective certainty) and isolation (no one else has my experiences). Facing
these givens can provoke intolerable anxiety (angst), to manage these rules,
beliefs and behaviours are used by people to defend against this angst. Any
time these defensive rules\beliefs\behaviours are threatened it provokes
anxiety which is what the client present with. So, the
work is to find with the client in their symptom what way of being\believing is
threatened that provokes their anxiety. This then gives access to what the defensive
strategy their symptom is towards, and what conceivable existential given they
are trying to manage. So, I must be strong, might be trying to manage death anxiety,
or meaninglessness...
I think the irony here is that we all as humans face this
and as a therapist you sit with your client, and you have your ways of managing
these things. So, for instance, to avoid the angst of meaninglessness you might
resort to habitual ways of interpreting clients with the client you currently
sit with. Your anxiety with temporality is that there is never enough time so
you may try to pack a lot into a session.
You might think success is an antidote to meaninglessness, so you look
to succeed in every session….
There is an excellent journal article on Existential
understandings of anxiety by Nick Kirkland-Handley here
https://journal.existentialanalysis.org.uk/ea/issue/view/417/349
Yalom death anxiety
Protect against death by being special, irreplaceable,
powerful, engaging with an ultimate rescuer e.g. religious leader.
Symptoms of anxiety can be the outcome of trying to defend
against existential anxieties, so drugs only numb the secondary symptoms. Likewise,
symptoms of anxiety can be the way to defend against problems of living.
Ontological insecurity
Connection with Laing, symptoms of schizophrenia are a
defensive reaction to an impossible situation, the double bind. Existential
givens as an impossible situation.
Ontological insecurity: where one part of you can’t accept
another part of you, likewise there can be a split between self and other, what
the other tells you and what you want to do.
3 basic questions are raised for the ontological insecure,
that one is, what one is, and who one is.
Implosion: taken over by something inside me (alien, dr Jeckell)
Engulfment: taken over by another (devil)
Petrification: the fear of being
turned into something lifeless (zombie)
Schizophrenia: the symptoms of the defence against
ontological insecurity
Schizoid
A part of you is deemed unacceptable. You are a bad child.
To cope with that, that part of you that can’t exist, you fragment, by denying
that part of you. Which can lead to DID.
Can also lead to paranoia, as the denied part shows itself, well it can’t be
me, must be controlled by external forces.
For Laing, good=agrees with family code, bad the opposite.
The problem is not the rule per se, but the lack of
distinction between bad behaviour and bad being.
Young children make very little distinction between mental
acts and physical ones.
The you are bad, and I don’t love you, cut to the very core
of existence for a young child, the family then get to define their existence
based on their behaviour which can be equated with either mental or physical
acts.
Children then can attempt to deny their “bad” self to manage,
as it can’t be expressed as it threatens their being.
The ability to integrate this “bad” self is the key to
moving from adolescence to adulthood, the schizoid individual hasn’t made this
integration. The “bad” self represents a threat to their existence
The effect then is if I am good, I am loved if I am bad then
love is removed. Development then is either never bad to significant others by
denying that part of you, or to develop yourself to manage competing demands
and be generally good.
Children fear monster under the bed, if an adult
denies\punishes their experience then you have two monsters.
Theres something in this. Client does things that don’t make
sense to you from your position\world, but from there’s absolutely do. They
might say I know its silly (a nod to others world) but I do it (a recognition
of their world). So, the first point is to understand their world to make sense
of their behaviours.
As a result of the family’s injunctions and rewards, we
learn to define who we are and whether we have a right to be. The family, then,
becomes not only the source of our ‘good’ or positive definitions of self, but
it also serves the function of defining those ‘bad’ or negative aspects of self
which must not be allowed to be expressed (mentally or behaviourally) because
to express them threatens not only our relations with the family (and others in
general) but also our internal relations, that is, our very being.
Schizoid, as arrested development, not being able to
integrate their bad self into themselves and trying to be good all the time to
family\friends. Losing existence to the
family can be understood as family withdrawing love if you are bad, likewise
the internalised family operating in the same way. The family might also act as
if the bad self didn’t exist the person didn’t exist.
Schizoid has feeling and erratic moments of both good and
bad
Spinelli argues that it’s the interpretation of
chemical\genetics that results in behaviour and that’s why people respond
different to drink, drugs etc.
Hmm this is tricky, the interpretation to biology or
chemistry, to drugs or genetics. True
people respond differently but interpretation. I can get behind some level of
implicit memory with drugs. Association with the feeling and other
states\memories\neural pathways. With
genetics, I have a gloomy predisposition, will I be depressed, well it depends
how this works out within your context, and how you choose to respond. I suppose
within the noetic, there is an interpretation, I am gloomy I don’t like this, I
will go and sing. I don’t like this because the experiences I have had in my
life, say that I don’t want to be a gloomy person for instance.
Rogers
Rogers=all humans strive for actualisation but due to
fragmentation, denial, disassociation from our being can be hampered, so
therapy means noticing out defences and then integrating them. Therapists can’t attend to theory and client
so attend to client to reflect their world to them.
Don’t ask questions, don’t interpret, stay with the client’s
frame of reference, don’t make causal links. I can imagine PCT done badly is
awful for clients.
The core conditions
Prize the client as a parent prizes a child, their being not
their current behaviour. To accept
unconditionally means focussing on the process, the noesis. So have a story,
what happens in the world, I perceive x, and my feelings about it are it
conflicts with y, it’s something that my dad wants, I want to break free of dad.
UPR: it can be bad behaviour but it’s not a bad person.
Our differing ‘stories’ demand judgements that can either
unite or separate us. But the effects that are linked to each are shared by all
members of our species. In focusing on these unifying effects, both
story-teller and listener acknowledge their humanity, recognize each other’s
being and are at least more likely to accept it unconditionally.
Accurate empathy: getting the clients frame of reference.
AKA active listening.
Congruence: therapist be present without façade. Be a model of integration.
Some see the core conditions as therapeutically lacking,
more doing needed, but core conditions offer being.
PCT theory is simple, provide the right relationship, client
will develop.
PCT practice is complex, client bias=be defenceless victim
that therapist fixes. Therapists trained
in number of theories then will try to offer what the client wants
PCT relationship difficult as it runs counter to other
relationships learnt in society, so it is a relationship that sees both as defenceless.
Rogers is not existential because
1.
He’s a dualist, good self-actualising, false
self
2.
Humans are naturally good.
3.
He is not relational; there is objective truth
Bateson: schizogenesis complementary and symmetrical, how in
relationship there can be an opposite symmetry.
Complementary each part supplies what the other lacks. Symmetrical the
two sides match each other perfectly.
This enables the self to be defined whilst distinguishing it from the
other.
Chapter 9 Phenomenological and humanistic
psychologies: similarities and contrasts
Phenomenology moves away from deterministic bio social
models that see human behaviour as conditioned. Human free will, creativity, motivation
by meaning, are all attempted to be explained away by the reductionists.
Humanistic psychology came out of encounter groups, counterculture,
and the dissatisfaction with psycho analysis and behaviourism.
Central tenets of humanistic psychology
1.
Conscious experience is the primary source of
data
2.
Humans are beings with many different facets which
added together makes them who they are, you can’t break them down into bits=>holism
3.
Even with the givens, humans are free, to
interpret and react how they see fit
4.
Human conscious experience is genuine and not
amenable to reductionism
5.
No complete theory of human experience\
behaviour is possible
Humanism sees humans as good and will develop that given the
right conditions, Existential therapists see that we can be good or bad
dependent on our choices. Likewise
Existential therapists see dialogue and relationship as core to human
existence.
Humanistic approaches emphasise the individual, self-development,
empowerment, but doesn’t consider the effect on others, and therefore the
returning effect on self
As a result, rather than promote co-operation, humility and
shared responsibility, the great majority of humanistic techniques (if
unwillingly) have fostered competition, self-aggrandizement and disdain for
others’ inter-relationally derived experiences.
Key Differences between Phenomenological and Humanistic
Psychologies
Four key divergences between humanistic and phenomenological
psychologies:
1) the centrality of experience;
2) the issue of actualization in general or
self-actualization in particular;
3) the hypothesis of ‘wholeness’ and ‘integration’;
4) the status of ‘the
self’.
Experience
Humanistic think it’s given and doesn’t need theory.
Existential think it needs to be explored, Ive chosen to pay
attention to this experience, this experience is informed by my context.
Self-actualisation
Existential therapists talk of phenomenologically derived
notions of inter-relational openness, disclosure and dialogue, to explain human
engagement and progressive experience.
humanistic authors
have altered the meaning of ‘authenticity’ so that it now expresses a person’s
subjectively felt experience of self-congruence and integration.
Heidegger sees authentic as ownership of being, what shows
itself
The Self
John Rowan asserts that ‘the real self – the self which is
to be actualised in self-actualisation – is not a concept but an experience. It
is not something to be argued at a philosophical level, it is thing to be
encountered at an experiential level’
But existential therapy argues there is no concept, culture
free experience as with the self.
Chapter 10 Phenomenology and the Major Systems in
Psychology
Three critical philosophically derived obstacles stand in
the way of any substantive rapprochement between psychoanalysis and
phenomenology: psychoanalysts’ :
1.
linear causality
2.
the accessibility of past events
3.
unconscious mental system whose functions can
be distinguished from, and impact directly upon, conscious experience.
Phenomenologists question the very possibility, much less
its value, of understanding and predicting human behaviour based on a notion of
causality that is both linear (from A to B to C to D, and so forth) and
unidirectional (from the past onto the present).
while phenomenological psychologists would certainly agree
that past experience plays a major, even central, role in the person’s current
psychic life, they would also take the view that the past is a far more
flexible construct, undergoing continual reassessment and reinterpretation.
The psychoanalytic function of the unconscious is the same
in phenomenology, where there may be an unreflection, a forced interpretation
on the world, to protect from the raw being in the world, e.g. taking truths
from on high, seeing yourself as a certain person, even when there is evidence
to the contrary
‘An unconscious desire is a desire which a person
experiences, but which the person does not recognize for what it is’
Similarities between free association and the
phenomenological method. Free association: say whatever comes into your mind
without censorship, Phenomenological method: just describe without prejudice.
How could you ever meet someone if all there is, is
transferential relationship?
Phenomenology and CBT
Behaviourism’s claims that we are primarily passive reactors
to directly experienced stimuli.
Phenomenological psychology’s stance, on the other hand, is
to argue that we are active interpreters of the stimuli in that our response to
them is intentionally determined through both innate invariants and individual
experience.
CBT Problems
(a) the current lack of any coherent, integrated theory that
links the various sub-theories united by their emphases on mediational
processes;
(b) the over-reliance on information-processing metaphors
which, though partially useful, remain incapable of providing models of human
behaviour that accurately represent human (as opposed to machine)
information-processing;
(c) the failure to give proper consideration to the emotional
content underlying human decision making.
Piaget: assimilation of world to existing structures,
accommodation, changing those structures in relation to the world’s
effects=dialogue
Chapter 11 A Critical Overview of Phenomenological
Psychology
Husserl’s central argument was that we do not experience the
physical world as it actually is in its ‘pure’, or ‘real’, state, but that the
world we experience is an interpreted world that has been shaped both by
in-built biological invariants and by the experience-based values, beliefs,
attitudes and biases and the embodied effects which accompany them.
The ‘real’ world, though it exists independent of our
consciousness of it, remains obscure and is, ultimately, unknowable.
Intentionality explicitly refers to the directional nature
of consciousness insofar as consciousness is always of something. Natural
science has intentionality as the subject and object, phenomenology sees these
as being interrelated, indivisible.
We are a combination of shared meaning and interpretations
and unique (not sure how much though!).
The phenomenological method aims to get this unique
interpretation, through bracketing our assumed meanings.
Phenomenology isn’t a reductive approach. It has
assumptions, intentionality, invariants, the givens, but it isn’t reductive to
an essence. It sees humans as active creators of their lives, through their
perception and behaviour, and the social constructions that they are part of.
Challenges to phenomenology
Are all mental phenomena intentional
They argue that awareness of feeling and sensing is
intentional in that it is the experience of something, but the phenomena
themselves need not be. This is murky this gets into the noumena. There is a
feeling in my body (the tree falling in the wood) and this isn’t intentional;
it is only intentional when I am aware of it. But did it exist for me prior to
my awareness. Is it a phenomenon, I’d say no, and this feels like a waste of
time these thoughts.
The Problem of Non-existent Objects
Present king of France idea, that exists as an experience of
it that the words the thoughts point at.
The problem of infinite regress
If we are aware of our thoughts, e.g. I am thinking, then
there is another though that is aware of this, I am aware that I am aware that
I am thinking. So, like with the consciousness being a man watching a tv in our
head these regresses to someone watching that on a tv.
Counter argument we are not aware of the act of
experiencing. So, we have a thought, I experience it, but this experiencing,
isn’t a mental act, almost the experiencings of thought stands outside it but
you can’t stand outside the experiencing as that is you
Psychological Criticisms
Phenomenology is seen as not having observable,
generalisable rules, it is subjective so therefore not scientific.
Is introspectionism the same as phenomenological psychology?
Moreover, while in an introspective report, objects and
meanings were excluded, in a phenomenological study they are essential.
People interpret their world given the socio\cultural
influences, plus their individual experiences and current desires. So,
phenomenology says we create the world, behaviourism says we are passive to it.
Phenomenologists believe in a world out there (that is
ultimately unknowable) but it is our interpretation of it, that makes the world
that we engage with.
There is also the criticism of how can we talk of a world,
if we all have individual experiences (and we do, so we can’t) . But we have a
shared framework and unique perspectives, we might both being talking about
red, we can point it out in the world, but it might look slightly different to
each of us.
Phenomenology denies the possibility of truly objective
observation and analysis.
There aren’t objective facts, these are only seen in relation
to meaning imbuing subjects.
Postmodernity and Beyond
Phenomenology can lapse into full blown relativism, then
Terry Eagleton 20041, how can we have universals and some sense of the
objective
