IPA Inter-Regional Encyclopedic Dictionary of Psychoanalysis

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Further, Korbivcher (2005, 2010, 2013b, 2017) developed ideas, linking autistic and unintegrated phenomena to Bion´s theory, particularly to the theory of Transformations and his thoughts on embryonic mind written in his last papers. The notion of Bion about a multidimensional mind offers a basis for the idea of other types of transformations. Korbivcher expanded on Tustin’s inclusion of autistic and unintegrated phenomena in the theory of Transformations and proposed the constitution of two new groups of transformation : autistic transformations and unintegrated transformations that could be located along with transformations of the neurotic and the psychotic range. Autistic transformations according to Korbivcher develop in an autistic environment, which implies the absence of the notion of an object. The relationship between “me” and “not- me” is substituted by “sensations objects” – autistic objects and autistic shapes – with no representation in the mind. Absence of emotional life, emptiness, and auto-sensorial activities are some of the invariants in autistic transformations. When Bion introduced the concept of transformations in hallucinosis in the theory of Transformations (1965), he considerably expanded the field of observation in psychoanalysis. He highlighted psychotic phenomena with different qualities then those considered thus far just projective identification phenomena. With the introduction of autistic transformations in the theory of Transformations, the field of phenomena widens even further. The non-representation phenomena present in the mind are included in autistic transformations, which make those transformations belong to a separate universe – an autistic area – organized by a specific logic, different from those of neurosis and psychosis. In neurotic and psychotic areas, according to Bion (1962b), the emotional links L (love), H (hate), K (knowledge), and their negatives permeate any relationship that connects objects. In the autistic area, however, there is no notion of internal or external object, so we may presume that this is an area of absence of links, an area of “no-links” . The dimension of the mind to which autistic transformations belongs is of “existing” and “not existing” and not K or – K (knowledge; no knowledge) as they occur in the groups of transformations proposed by Bion. Autistic phenomena would belong to an area connected to beta elements , but they are of different quality . Bion defined beta elements as sensorial elements not transformed by alpha function and therefore, they are not appropriate for thought. They are non-digested sensorial stimuli, and are unloaded or expelled, with the intention of freeing the mental apparatus of the accumulation of tension. This creates a barrier made of beta elements - the Beta screen - which means an accumulation of beta elements. Autistic phenomena, on the other hand, have a motionless nature of belonging to the inanimate world . One can suppose that, like alpha and beta elements, which, when grouped, give rise respectively to the contact barrier and the Beta screen, the grouped autistic elements create a protective “autistic barrier”. The individual seeks protection through this autistic barrier and, with auto-sensual activities, generates his own object, an object with autistic characteristics (Tustin, 1986, 1990). Unlike beta elements, autistic elements do not provide

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