Catharsis (psychology)

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In psychology, catharsis ( Greek  κάθαρσις "cleaning") describes the hypothesis that living out inner conflicts and repressed emotions leads to a reduction in these conflicts and feelings. The term catharsis is mainly used when expressing or channeling aggression - including symbolic - such as hitting a sandbag or alternatively acting out aggressive feelings in a fictional or virtual form (e.g. via theater, film, video game) a reduction in negative emotions (anger, anger) is to be achieved. The popular assumption, based on Aristotle , of the cathartic effect of aggressive actions is controversial and has been refuted many times.

theory

The term catharsis comes from ancient Greece, was applied to body and soul by Plato and has about the connotations that cleansing also has in German. There it is used, among other things, in medicine for the application of emetics, but also in the context of ritual cleansing . Aristotle 's use of 'catharsis' in poetics has a special effect . There he speaks in his tragedy theory of catharsis through misery / emotion and horror / shudder (from Greek éleos and phóbos, which Lessing translated in a misleading way with pity and fear ; see also Poetics: Tragedy Definition ), although it remains unclear whether this be purified by oneself or whether to be purified from the emotions and whether completely or only from an excess of these emotions. As a result of medical interpretations of poetics in the 19th century, the term was taken up by Josef Breuer and Sigmund Freud and the ethologists Konrad Lorenz and Irenäus Eibl-Eibesfeldt .

The catharsis hypothesis played an important role in psychoanalysis between 1880 and 1895 . Freud, however, gradually broke away from the cathartic method in favor of free association - a method that clearly deviates from catharsis and which is still the basic rule of psychoanalytic treatment technology today.

rating

Initially, experiments in the 1960s provided evidence for the above hypothesis. Numerous replication attempts of earlier experiments did not lead to a confirmation, but to contrary results. Acting out aggression, for example, does not result in a reduction, but an increase in aggressive tendencies. In the mid-1980s, Seymour Feshbach (a main proponent) also distanced himself from this thesis.

In more recent studies on catharsis thesis , Bushman et al. Showed, among others, that test subjects who were primed to believe in catharsis or whose belief in catharsis was assessed had an increased potential for aggression compared to the control group. This leads to the conclusion that consciously evoked aggressive actions subconsciously reinforce themselves through feedback effects also on a mental level.

According to a recent study that examined the use of the term catharsis, the idea of ​​media catharsis (catharsis through observation and mental experience of aggression in the media) is based on a confusion of terms. Accordingly, the term used by Feshbach is an unwanted mixture of psychoanalytic and behavioristic concepts and is contradicting itself.

Nonetheless, within the applied psychotherapy scene there are diverse experience-activating procedures that go beyond the context-free execution of simple aggression exercises as they occur in statistical experimental studies . Within a guided therapeutic process, so-called emotional deepening should be stimulated and accompanied in relation to the biographical context, which can lead from a purely intellectual reflection of the feelings through a minimal emotional expression to involuntary autonomous body reactions (sobbing, shaking). Primary adaptive emotions that are related to dysfunctional emotional schemata , which in turn go back to inadequately fulfilled basic needs , are to be activated, acted out and modified by subsequent need fulfillment . Cathartic reactions are not uncommon in bonding psychotherapy , psychodrama and systemic family constellations , for example . Here, catharsis does not exclusively refer to aggression, as is usually the case in experimental research, but also to other primary feelings such as sadness, pain, anger, disgust, and also love, joy, lust and gratitude.

Similar emotional deepening levels up to involuntary cathartic emotional expression are described in different psychotherapeutic procedures, for example in integrative therapy ( Hilarion Petzold , Gestalt therapy ) and the above-mentioned bonding psychotherapy. In integrative therapy there is a differentiating concept in which the acting catharsis theory of aggression and mourning is criticized as problematic because it could deepen dysfunctional emotional pathways. Rather, gentle processes of reliving with cognitive and emotional working through should promote the integration of stressful life stories. In body psychotherapeutic work (body therapy), storage from body memory , i.e. H. Interoceptions, are called. Here, too, it is not about a so-called “cathartic discharge”, as it is represented in many other body psychotherapies, but about cognitive and emotional influences on alternative forms of embodiment and to promote resilience in integrative therapy .  

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Albert Bandura : Aggression. A social-learning theory analysis. Klett-Cotta Verlag, Stuttgart 1979, ISBN 3-12-920521-7
  2. ↑ Annemarie Leibbrand-Wettley : Approach to a history of psychotherapy. In: Old Problems - New Approaches. Three lectures by Fritz Krafft, Kurt Goldammer, Annemarie Wettley (Würzburg 1964). Wiesbaden 1965 (= contributions to the history of science and technology. Volume 5), pp. 42–57, here: p. 42 f.
  3. ^ Elisabeth Roudinesco and Michel Plon: Dictionnaire de la Psychanalyse (1997). Translated from French by: Christoph Eissing-Christophersen u. a .: Dictionary of psychoanalysis . Springer, Vienna 2004, pp. 528f., ISBN 3-211-83748-5
  4. ↑ Seymour Feshbach, R.D. Singer: Television and Aggression. An Experimental Field Study. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco 1971.
  5. ↑ Seymour Feshbach: Emotion and motivation. In: Jo Groebel, Peter Winterhoff-Spurk (Hrsg.): Empirical Media Psychology. Munich 1989, pp. 65-75.
  6. ↑ Brad J. Bushman, RF Baumeister, CM Phillips: Do people aggress to improve their Mood? Catharsis beliefs, affect regulation opportunity, and aggressive responding. In: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Volume 81, 2001, pp. 17-32.
  7. ^ Daniel Hug: Katharsis. Re-vision of a controversial concept. Turnshare 2004.
  8. ↑ Konrad Stauss: Bonding Psychotherapy Basics and Methods . Kösel-Verlag, Munich 2006, p. 63ff.
  9. ↑ Bloem, J., Moget, P., Hilarion Petzold: Budo, aggression reduction and psychosocial effects: fact or fiction? - Research results models psychological and neurobiological concepts. Ed .: Integrative Therapy. tape 1-2 , 2004, pp. 101–149 ( fpi-publikation.de [PDF]).
  10. ↑ Petzold, HG: Consolation / Consolation Work and Mourning / Mourning Work - Concepts, Models, Contexts - Materials from Integrative Therapy. Ed .: Topic Pro Senectute. Volume 3. Vienna, Graz 2007, p. 40-49 .
  11. ^ Petzold, HG, Orth, I .: Epitome. POLYLOGUE IN INTEGRATIVE THERAPY: “Mentalizations and empathy”, “Embodiments and interoception” - basic concepts for “complex learning” in an intermethodical process of “co-creative thinking and writing”. In: Petzold, HG, Leeser, B., Klempnauer, E. (Ed.): When language heals. Handbook for poetry and bibliotherapy, biography work, creative writing. Festschrift for Ilse Orth. Aisthesis Verlag, Bielefeld 2017, p. 885-971 .