Healing Affects In Clinical Practice:

 The Biology And Psychodynamics Of Emotion And Attachment

 

Instructors: Thomas M Brod, MD , Regina Pally, MD, and James S Grotstein, MD

 

Thomas M Brod, MD is a member and faculty of LAPSI, a Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, and is in full-time private practice.

 

Regina Pally, MD is a member and faculty of LAPSI, a  Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, and is in full-time private practice.

 

James S Grotstein, MD is a member and faculty of LAPSI, a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, and is in full-time private practice.

 

Course Summary

 

This nine-hour course, intended for psychoanalysts and experienced therapists, derives from Diana Fosha’s elegant work on emotional communication in practice, The Transforming Power of Affect (Basic Books, 2000).  Intense affects are toxic to psychic development without a mind to contain them, but comparable emotional experience with relational support promotes security development.  We will review current research on affect and attachment/attunement.  Clinical videotape vignettes will be used.  Format will be lecture with active discussion encouraged.

 

“The principle function of emotion is one of communication—namely the communication, both to the self and to others of the current motivational state of the individual.” John Bowlby (1991)

 

syllabus and outline

Healing Affects In Clinical Practice:

 The Biology And Psychodynamics Of Emotion And Attachment

 

Mondays 7:45 – 9:15 pm September 24 – October 29, 2001

Six 90 minute sessions

I. Sept. 24        Introduction  (Dr. Brod)

Concepts of Diana Fosha, PhD: Core Affect, Core State and Transformation.

II. Oct. 1           Attachment (Dr. Pally)

            Definition, typology, neurobiology; primate and parent-infant research

III. Oct. 8        Attunement and Mirroring (Dr. Pally)

Infant research and the implications of expectancy, how human relationships work (including transference and counter-transference).

IV. Oct. 15      Intense Emotional Experience (Drs. Brod, Pally)

            Affect theory from Darwin through contemporary observers

How emotion organizes the brain: rational thinking, perception, behavioral motor response, body physiology.

V. Oct. 22         Self-Regulation (neurodynamics) and the regulation of affects, impulses, and the sense of safety (psychodynamics). (Dr. Grotstein).

VI. Oct. 29        Review and Discussion of Fosha’s Work (Dr. Brod)

              Clinical dynamics of moment-to-moment fluctuations in mutual affective communication.

 

Objectives

The prime objective of this course is to explore the challenge of Diana Fosha, PhD : “How can the therapist evoke a relational environment in which the transformational power of affective experience can contribute to the emergence and development of the patient’s essential self?”  Towards this end, the course has the following study objectives:

  1. To understand the biology, psychophysiology, and psychology of affects.
  2.  To understand the psychobiology of attachment.
  3.  To understand the psychobiology of non-verbal communication.
  4.  To understand the synergy between attachment and affect.
  5.  To differentiate psychodynamic forces within the self from biologic expressions which impact self/other dynamics.
  6.  To understand core affective experience with respect to self and relational phenomena

Bibliography

Fosha, Diana, The Transforming Power of Affect: A Model For Accelerated Change, Basic Books, 2000

Supplementary reading

Bartels, A. and Zeki, S (2000) The neural basis of romantic love.  Neuroreport 11:3829-34

Beebe, B., Jaffe, J., & Lachman, F.M. (1992). A dyadic systems view of communication.  In N. Skolnick & S. Warshaw (Eds.), Relational perspectives in psychoanalysis (pp.61-81).  Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.

Bowlby, J.  (1988). A secure base:  Parent-child attachment and healthy human development.  New York : Basic Books.

Darwin, C (1872/1965). The expression of emotion in man and animals.  Chicago: Univ of Chicago Press.

Fonagy, P., Leigh, T., Kennedy, R., et al.  (1995).  Attachment, borderline states and the representation of emotions and cognitions in self and others.  In D. Cicchetti, S.L. Toth, et al. (Eds), Emotion, Cognition, and representation (pp.371-414).  Rochester, NY: Univ of Rochester Press.

Fonagy, P., Steele, M., Steele, H., et al. (1995).  Attachment, the reflective self, and borderline states.  In S. Goldberg, R. Muir, & J. Kerr (Eds.) Attachment theory: Social, developmental, and clinical perspectives (pp. 233-278). Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.

Francis, D, et al (1999)  Nongenomic transmission across generations of maternal behavior and stress response in the rat.  Science   286: 1155-58

Hofer, M (1996) On the nature of early loss.  Psychosomatic Medicine 58:570-81

Insel, T. and Young R. (2001).   The neurobiology of attachment.  Nature Reviews Neuroscience 2: 129-36

Jones,J.M. (1995).  Affects as process. Hillsdale, NJ: The Analytic Press

Kalin, N. et al (1995)  Opiate systems in mother and infant primates coordinate intimate contact during reunion.  Psychoendocrinology  20:735-742

Pally, R. (2001)  The Mind-Brain Relationship. London: Karnac Press.

Tomkins, S.S. (1962).  Affect, imagery, and consciousness: Vol 1. The positive affects. New York: Springer.

Tomkins, S.S. (1962).  Affect, imagery, and consciousness: Vol 2. The negative affects. New York: Springer.

 

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