Fall Courses 2016

This course will focus on an in-depth study of countertransference. Its theoretical development and application to clinical practice will be studied through assigned reading, discussion of case material, and class interaction. Students will examine subjective and objective countertransference reactions and identify the feelings that may emerge during treatment.
Please include your email address on the registration form to receive an article prior to the first class.

Over the past 100 years the psychoanalytic community has conceptualized and treated addiction in a variety of ways. This course traces both the roots and evolution of psychoanalytic perspectives on addiction, discusses the development of treatment modalities, and elucidates the relationship between scientific findings and clinical treatment efforts.
Please include your email address on the registration form to receive an article prior to the first class.

(Required for Treatment Service Students)
This course addresses the practical and clinical issues relevant to the Treatment Service experience. It includes, among other issues, the requirements of the Treatment Service setting; understanding patients’ dynamics as shown in their transference, symbolic communications, verbalizations, behaviors, and dreams; comprehending and resolving patients’ resistances; managing subjective and objective countertransference; resolving countertransference resistance; and employing supervisory counsel. Students trace the onset and course of symptoms and consider prognosis.

This class provides an intensive examination of the early development of psychoanalysis, beginning with Breuer and Freud’s (1895) theoretical/clinical discoveries about the origins and treatment of hysteria and anxiety, and the establishment of the method of psychoanalytic inquiry. It explores Freud’s hypotheses about the function of sexuality in normal and pathological development; the psychological meaning of symptoms; the mechanisms of dream formation and interpretation; and the shift from the topographical to the structural model of the mind.
Please include your email address on the registration form to receive an article prior to the first class.

Using readings and case presentations, students examine normal and pathological development during this earliest period of life; consider constitutional and environmental factors that affect maturation; and explore how the oral and anal phases shape character development. As they trace patterns of infantile experience, students are able to understand instinctual life and recognize fixations evident in the narcissistic disorders.

Students attain a theoretical understanding of the development of gender identification and the subsequent variations in sexual orientation and practice. Through readings and case presentations, students learn to identify blocks to sexual maturity and satisfaction; understand the etiology of deviations from the usual course of development; and consider how issues of gender and sexuality influence personality organization.

(Required for Treatment Service Students)
In this class, students receive supervision of their individual patients at the Treatment Service, with a focus on understanding patient dynamics-both transference and resistance- and the analyst’s countertransference issues. In addition, the group formulates a diagnostic picture of the presented cases, discusses intervention strategies, and seeks to resolve treatment impasses.