Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis is a term coined by Sigmund Freud describing the various forces working on the mind, mainly of our consciousness and its connection to early childhood experiences. In contemporary mental health treatment both psychoanalysis and psychodynamic psychotherapy follow the same principle, with the former being a more intense treatment and the latter less intense. Currently, the two main psychoanalytic theories are the interpersonal/relational model, which focuses on the actual relationship between analyst and patient, and the intrapsychic model, which focuses on how the actual relationship is influenced by mental representations of early relationships, which persist as unconscious fantasies. In recent years, there have been many empirical studies of psychodynamic psychotherapy and the field of neuro-psychoanalysis has attempted to integrate basic psychoanalytic concepts with modern cognitive/affective neuroscience.