Psychoanalytic Diagnosis: Understanding Personality Organization

Part Two

TYPES OF CHARACTER ORGANIZATION

INTRODUCTION TO PART TWO

Each chapter in this section covers a major character type. I have chosen these types on the basis of the frequency with which they are encountered clinically and on the basis of my own clinical familiarity and confidence working with them. As I noted in the Preface, some personalities that I do not cover in this section are depicted in the Psychodynamic Diagnostic Manual.

Order of presentation is arbitrary, but overall, I have started with the least object related and ended with individuals who tend to strike therapists as powerful in their attachment, even though their specific attachment style may be problematic. With each personality I consider (one) drive, affect, and temperament; (two) adaptive and defensive ego functions; (three) early relational patterns that contribute to the development of the personality, become internalized, and repeat in later relationships; (four) experiences of the self, including conscious and unconscious ways one sees oneself, along with the ways one seeks self-esteem; (five) transference and countertransference outcomes of internal representations of self, others, and self-other patterns of interaction; (six) implications for treatment; and (seven) considerations of differential diagnosis.