The Adaptive Design of the Human Psyche: Psychoanalysis, Evolutionary Biology, and the Therapeutic Process [Hardcover]

Malcolm Owen Slavin (Author), Daniel Kriegman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 25, 1992 | ISBN-10: 0898627958 | ISBN-13: 978-0898627954 | Edition: 1

This important new work connects evolutionary biological concepts to modern psychoanalytic theory and the clinical encounter. Synthesizing their years of experience in the practice of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis, the authors provide a comparative psychoanalytic map of current theoretical controversies and a new way of deconstructing the hidden assumptions that underlie Freudian, Ego Psychological, Kleinian, Object Relational, Self Psychological, and Interpersonal theories. In so doing, they provide a new vantage point from which to integrate competing models into a larger picture that more fully embraces the many facets of human nature. Moreover, they offer clinicians a new framework with which to understand and respond to the inevitable paradoxes and conflicts that arise in the therapeutic relationship.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This "adaptive design" is a landmark in the field of psychoanalysis. Recent advances in evolutionary theory have radically transformed the ways evolutionary biologists have understood the brain and interpret behavior, and there is a burgeoning literature on "evolutionary psychology." But the fear of simplistic reductionism, of "biologizing" psychodynamic phenomena, and the formidably different languages of biology and psychoanalysis have conspired to keep these fields apart. Slavin and Kriegman eloquently argue that even the most hermaneutic tradition incorporates implicit assumptions about human nature; the question is how adequate these assumptions are when deconstructed into their underlying meanings. The authors recognize that the human brain has an innate, evolved "psychological deep structure," and that human psychodynamics reveal an "adaptive system with a long evolutionary history." This perspective enables them to probe the inconsistencies and contradictions in competing models in the psychological and psychoanalytic traditions, and then outline a synthesis that incorporates the underlying features of them all. The result has profound implications for practicing clinicians. Thoroughly scholarly and professional, yet lucidly accessible, this is essential reading for anyone interested in the psychodynamics of the mind." --Irven Devore, Harvard University Department of Anthropology

"Psychoanalysis has waited one hundred years for this book....In an extraordinary and perceptive way, [the authors] point the way towards a more unified--rather than patched together--psychoanalytic theory that takes us beyond the dichotomous positions that have haunted psychoanalysis for nearly a century....A total, dramatic, and convincing reworking of psychoanalytic theory....It is [also] very much a clinical book which, if read carefully, will change every therapist's stance." --Jonathan H. Slavin, Ph.D.

"Slavin and Kriegman argue for an evolutionary foundation for psychoanalysis, in a magnificent monograph that is elegantly constructed, well reasoned, and thoroughly accessible....At a crucial moment in the history of psychoanalysis, [their book] brings to our attention the relevant tenets of modern evolutionary theory in an encompassing fashion; and it uses this theory as an external platform' from which to more objectively examine the currently competing major paradigms in psychoanalysis....As a result, the authors offer a novel synthesis to resolve the dichotomy between classical drive-theory-based ego psychology and the relational theories....
Profound erudition and sophistication, coupled with a deep anchoring in clinical observations and methodologic concerns, make this an exciting new contribution to our field." --Paul H. Ornstein, M.D.

"In this far-reaching and provocative work, Slavin and Kriegman use evolutionary theory to unify classical and relational' psychoanalysis. The Adaptive Design Of The Human Psyche is a major contribution to what will be a growing debate concerning the biological roots of psychoanalysis. This is a necessary and important book." --Arnold H. Modell, M.D.

"Many have dreamed of building a bridge between Darwin and Freud (including Freud himself)....Slavin and Kriegman have now stepped forward with a brilliantly argued book linking [these] two worlds....This book is sophisticated in its evolutionary thinking and rich in its therapeutic detail....[The authors] have shown in depth and in detail how to critique and transform psychoanalytic thinking using evolutionary logic." --From the Foreword by Robert Trivers, Ph.D.

"In this beautifully written volume, Slavin and Kriegman demonstrate that modern evolutionary biology can provide and overarching framework for psychoanalysis that both illuminates the complexities of human interrelatedness and provides a basis for synthesizing disparate currents in contemporary psychoanalytic thought. By bringing into sharp focus their hidden, evolved, adaptive dimensions, the book sheds new and valuable light on such clinically crucial phenomena as repetition, conflict, repression, transference, and resistance, and offers as well a fascinating redescription of the analytic process itself. Those who seek a viable biological grounding for psychoanalysis will find THE ADAPTIVE DESIGN OF THE HUMAN PSYCHE a tour de force." --Robert D. Stolorow, Ph.D., Training and Supervising Analyst, Institute of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, Los Angeles

About the Author

Malcolm Owen Slavin, Ph.D., graduated from Yale, studied at the Sorbonne, and received a Ph.D. in psychology from Harvard University in 1972. He was a consultant to the Harvard North Africa Project in Tunisia and is the Director of Training at the Tufts University Counseling Center. Dr. Slavin is a director and one of the founders of the Massachusetts Institute for Psychoanalysis. He has contributed widely to the psychoanalytic literature and maintains a practice of psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, and supervision in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Guilford Press; 1 edition (September 25, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0898627958
• ISBN-13: 978-0898627954
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #188,449 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #44 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Biological Sciences > Biology > Developmental Biology

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5.0 out of 5 stars Psychoanalysis & Evolutionary Biology: Read it!, December 8, 1997

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This review is from: The Adaptive Design of the Human Psyche: Psychoanalysis, Evolutionary Biology, and the Therapeutic Process (Hardcover)

BOOK REVIEW The Adaptive Design of the Human Psyche: Psychoanalysis, Evolutionary Biology and the Therapeutic Process By Malcolm Slavin and Daniel Kriegman by Don Greif, Ph.D. The Adaptive Design of the Human Psyche: Psychoanalysis, Evolutionary Biology and the Therapeutic Process, by Malcolm Slavin and Daniel Kriegman, is a profound and creative work and an awesome accomplishment. The fact that it is brilliant is almost beside the point. For what Slavin and Kriegman have accomplished in this book is that they have come as close as anyone writing from a psychoanalytic point of view has ever come to capturing the essential nature of the human condition. They have provided a highly compelling and lucid description of human nature, in all of its complexity and paradoxicalness, that is inspiring and moving. It is also hard to read. But, and this is an understatement, it is well worth the effort. I can almost guarantee that you will be richly rewarded if you invest the time and energy necessary to understand what Slavin and Kriegman are saying. They use an adaptive theoretical framework, one which is largely based on contemporary evolutionary biology, as a vantage point from which to critically examine the basic premises about human nature which are contained within each of the two major psychoanalytic paradigms -- the classical and relational narrative traditions. Using an evolutionary framework, they elucidate the two narratives= respective assumptions about the nature of the human psyche and of the relational world, and they reveal the important truths about human nature and the psyche contained within each tradition. Through a process of examining and deconstructing important metaphors from both classical and relational traditions (repression, endogenous drives, and the true self) into their basic meanings, and then reconstructing those meanings into an evolutionary narrative, Slavin and Kriegman provide a new paradigm for psychoanalysis, one that synthesizes the essential truths contained in each narrative into a comprehensive framework or whole. The new evolutionary narrative which results appears to embrace, in a way that has not been achieved before, the inherently valid pieces of each narrative tradition. The evolutionary narrative which results from this synthesis depicts human beings, according to Slavin and Kriegman, "as innately individualistic and innately social; as endowed with inherently selfish, aggressively self-promoting aims, as well as an equally primary altruistic disposition toward those whose interests we share. We are, in short, never destined to attain the kind of highly autonomous individuality enshrined in the classical tradition, nor are we the "social animal" of the relational vision. We are essentially "semisocial" beings whose nature, or self-structure and motivational system, is inherently divided between eternally conflicting aims." (p. 281) Since Slavin and Kriegman use an evolutionary framework to evaluate the validity of the basic premises of the classical and relational models, one must wonder about the validity of evolutionary theory itself. It seems that evolutionary theory has widespread acceptance and credibility within the scientific world. It is perhaps close to having attained the same status as more familiar and broadly accepted scientific theories. In the November issue of Natural History the evolutionary biologist Jared Diamond stated the following: "As for the claim that evolution is an unproved theory, that's nonsense. Evolution is a fact, established with the same degree of confidence as our theory' of the round earth, our germ theory' of disease, and the atomic theory' of matter. Yes, there is lively debate about the particular evolutionary mechanisms that caused particular changes, but the existence of evolutionary change is not in doubt" (p. 19). For the purpose of evaluating Slavin and Kriegman's ideas, it is significant to note that evolutionary biological theory has a far different scientific status than psychoanalytic theory. As a scientific theory psychoanalysis has achieved little credibility in its first hundred years. It has achieved far more credibility as a method of treating psychological problems, and there its adherents consist mainly of its beneficiaries, that is, those who have gained personally from it, or from its offspring, psychoanalytic psychotherapy. It is contemporary evolutionary biological theory, largely through the work of Robert Trivers, that has vastly increased our understanding of the social environment. It is this theory that is most relevant to Slavin and Kriegman's work and to psychoanalysis, for it is understanding those forces that shape social evolution that has made it possible for Slavin and Kriegman to fulfill an aim that Freud sought but failed to achieve; mainly, to link the universal, underlying features of internal psychic structure to ancestral interpersonal experience. Slavin and Kriegman demonstrate that those psychodynamic features that comprise our "deep structure," such as the capacities for repression, regression, and transference, have evolved over the course of millions of years as adaptations to our environment, in particular to the unique and complex realities in our social or relational environment. The complex inner design of the human psyche has been shaped by the same forces that operate within the natural world to shape living organisms, mainly those that constitute natural selection. The basic universal features of the human psyche are a result of their having conferred an adaptive advantage on our ancestors; those humans who had these features were more successful at negotiating the complex relations dilemmas and paradoxes that faced them and were more successful, ultimately, at reproducing and surviving in that social environment. Robert Langs, in an article in the October 1993 issue of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, ("Psychoanalysis: Narrative Myth. or Narrative Science") criticizes Slavin and Kriegman for adopting a teleological position in their use of certain concepts. Referring to their conceptualization of repression as serving to safeguard aspects of an individual's "true self" so that they can be retrieved when relational conditions change, Langs states, "The ideas of a true self (all moments of selfhood are interactional in nature) and of the goal of self-actualization are teleological no matter how they are stated" (p. 580). It seems clear that Langs has not understood several central ideas in Slavin and Kriegman's book nor, it seems, has he understood evolutionary theory. Slavin and Kriegman see the existence of something like the "true self," some core, "endogenous" or independent source of motivation, not as an end in itself, but rather as a basic feature of the human psyche, part of its deep structural, adaptive design that has evolved over millions of years as a functional solution to a highly challenging and complex dilemma that has faced (and continues to face) the human child since the time of our prehuman ancestors, namely how to construct a self in a world where it is highly dependent for its identity on others whose interests not only overlap and converge but also necessarily diverge and, at times, conflict with its own. Slavin and Kriegman state, "Evolutionary theory suggests that even responsive, attuned, facilitative familial environments will inevitably be characterized by a highly ambiguous mixture of overlapping mutual interests, intrinsic conflict, and ongoing deception" (p. 121). Slavin and Kriegman believe that the "true self...may signify a dimension of our overall adaptive design...that seems to provide us with an absolutely critical source of information about our individual interests" (p. 176). In their view "a design element such as [the true self] became a critical, functional necessity for a species in which our s