Funcionamento psíquico e psicossomática: um estudo das relações entre o psíquico e o somático a partir das concepções psicanalíticas de Freud e Marty

Abstract

From investigations into paralysis, aphasia and hysteria, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) verified the dynamic reality of the unconscious and created Psychoanalysis. In Studies on Hysteria (1895), a work that Freud developed in partnership with Josef Breuer (1842-1925), it was hypothesized that hysterical women suffered from reminiscences, which made it clear that certain physical symptoms, such as those present in hysteria, could be associated with questions of a psychic nature, so the body would also be subject to the vicissitudes of the mind. The reflection on the relations between the psyche and the body, therefore, was present in Psychoanalysis from its very beginning. Pierre Marty (1918-1993), based on Freudian presuppositions, especially on the first psychic topic, developed hypotheses about the mental functioning of “somatic patients” and founded the so-called Paris Psychosomatic School. Seeking to give adequate conceptual support to his hypotheses, Marty introduced several new notions, the main ones being “operative thinking”, “essential depression” and “mentalization”. The general aim of the present study is to analyze the development of certain notions elaborated by Marty and to discuss to what extent the author followed or advanced in relation to the premises of Freud about the understanding of the mental processes and their interfaces with organic functioning. We conclude that the conceptions of the two authors are sometimes close and sometimes distant, and that Marty was able to deepen the understanding of the relation between the mind and the body based on the investigation of a field little explored by Freud.