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VI. Ci. Joseph Fernando – Trauma and ‘Zero Process Representations” A common idea in psychoanalytic theorizing about representation involves the concept of unrepresented experience following upon trauma . In this context, it is variously conceptualized that the overwhelming nature of traumatic situations interferes with the formation of normal representations and representational memory. As a contribution to, and expansion of, this line of theorizing, Joseph Fernando (2009, 2012) has suggested the term and concept of the zero process for the type of mental functioning formed after trauma, and further suggested that the zero process should be put alongside the primary process and the secondary process, which together could then be considered the three major ways in which the mind organizes itself. Fernando uses an ego psychological framework to conceptualize trauma as involving the shutting down of many functions such as symbolization, psychical integration, and perceptual synthesis, so that the experience of the trauma lacks these qualities, as do the core memories from the trauma. Furthermore, Fernando (2018b) states that as a consequence of these specific deficits post-traumatic memories, while having the basic quality of memory of being retained over time, in most other ways behave more like present experiences. As an example, zero process memories cannot be scanned back and forth as regular memories can be, but by contrast they run their course once evoked, outside of the person’s control, as do external experiences. Because of their ‘just happening’ or ‘about to happen’ character, zero process representations and structures present as independent centres of action and initiative: the most striking of these being the alters of Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID); but there are also more common examples of zero process structures, like introjects. Fernando (2018b) conceptualized this continuous push to turn zero process memories into experiences, as the zero process drive . He states that it is this drive characteristic that gives zero process structures such as alters, introjects, and the superego not just the feeling, but the reality, of being independent centres of initiative. These ideas have relevance for the concept of representation because they allow a framing of the nature of representation in post-traumatic states more precisely and more substantively. They allow a number of differentiations between these zero process representations and primary and secondary process representations of self and other and the world, and between zero process representations and states of non-representation based on deprivation and lack (Green, 1998). While many have conceptualized a form of post-traumatic mental functioning (Bion, 1962), the theory of the zero process, by explicitly putting it on equal footing with the primary and secondary processes, and sharply differentiating post-traumatic functioning from the primary process and from developmental processes and interferences (Fernando, 2018b), facilitates making more definite comparisons between different dynamics and forms of mental functioning in many areas, including that of representation. Zero process representations show a remarkable lack of symbolization , even primary process symbolization, and are thus concrete in a more radical manner than primary process representations (see separate entry SYMBOLIZATION). They could be seen as sitting half way between reality and representation ; as being the primordial stuff from which representations are formed from
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