Karl Abraham
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| Karl Abraham | |
|---|---|
 Karl Abraham | |
| Born | 3 May 1877 |
| Died | 25 December 1925 |
| Nationality | German |
| Fields | psychiatry |
Karl Abraham (3 May 1877 – 25 December 1925) was an early German psychoanalyst, and a correspondent of Sigmund Freud, who called him his 'best pupil'.[1] He founded the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute, and was the president of the International Psychoanalytical Association from 1914 to 1918 and again in 1925.
Karl Abraham collaborated with Freud on the understanding of manic-depressive illness, leading to Freud's paper on 'Mourning and Melancholia' in 1917. He was the analyst of Melanie Klein during 1924-1925, and of a number of other British psychoanalysts, including Edward Glover, James Glover, and Alix Strachey. He was a mentor for an influential group of German analysts, including Karen Horney, Helene Deutsch, andFranz Alexander.
Karl Abraham studied the role of infant sexuality in character development and mental illness and, like Freud, suggested that if psychosexual development is fixated at some point, mental disorders will likely emerge. He described the personality traits and psychopathology that result from the oral and anal stages of development (1921;1924a). In the oral stage of development, the first relationships children have with objects (caretakers) determine their subsequent relationship to reality. Oral satisfaction can result in self-assurance and optimism, whereas oral fixation can lead to pessimism and depression. Moreover, a person with an oral fixation will present a disinclination to take care of him/herself and will require others to look after him/her This may be expressed through extreme passivity (corresponding to the oral benign suckling substage) or through a highly active oral-sadistic behaviour (corresponding to the later sadistic biting substage) (1924a). In the anal stage, when the training in cleanliness starts too early, conflicts may result between a conscious attitude of obedience and an unconscious desire for resistance. This can lead to traits such as frugality, orderliness and obstinacy, as well as to obsessional neurosis as a result of anal fixation (Abraham,1921) . In addition, Abraham based his understanding of manic-depressive illness on the study of the painter Segantini: an actual event of loss is not itself sufficient to bring the psychological disturbance involved in melancholic depression. This disturbance is linked with disappointing incidents of early childhood; in the case of men always with the mother (Abraham, 1911). This concept of the prooedipal “bad” mother was a new development in contrast to Freud’s oedipal mother and paved the way for the theories of Melanie Klein (May-Tolzmann,1997). Another important contribution is his work “A short study of the Development of the Libido” (1924b), where he elaborated on Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” (1917) and demonstrated the vicissitudes of normal and pathological object relations and reactions to object loss. Moreover, Abraham investigated child sexual trauma and, like Freud, proposed that sexual abuse was common among psychotic and neurotic patients. Furthermore, he argued (1907) that dementia praecox is associated with child sexual trauma, based on the relationship between hysteria and child sexual trauma demonstrated by Freud.
Abraham (1920) also showed interest in cultural issues. He analyzed various myths suggesting their relation to dreams (1909) and wrote an interpretation of the spiritual activities of the monotheistic Pharaoh Amenhotep IV (1912).
Contents[hide] |
[edit]Publications
- Selected Papers on Psycho-Analysis, Publisher: Karnac Books; 1997, ISBN 0-9501647-7-1
[edit]Quotes
- A considerable number of persons are able to protect themselves against the outbreak of serious neurotic phenomena only through intense work
- What did we get ourselves into?
