Self-insight

ABSTRACT

Insight is an important notion in psychoanalysis, as it is regarded as the main mediator of psychic change in therapy. In this article I provide an account of a specific kind of insight, which I call self-insight. Self-insight is that which lies at the roots of what Bell and Leite (Bell, D., and A. Leite. 2016. “Experiential self-understanding.” The International Journal of Psychoanalysis 97 (2): 305–332) describe as experiential self-understanding, a process of increasing articulate awareness of one’s psychic life. So conceived, self-insight has four key characteristics: (1) it is distinct from merely intellectual self-knowledge, (2) it arises directly out of first-person experience, (3) it encompasses a lived perspective, and (4) it often requires the overcoming of resistance. My account of self-insight makes use of the notion of construal, a mental state that is constitutive of emotion and plays an important role in motivation. Specifically, I propose that one gains self-insight when one becomes insightfully conscious of a previously unconscious construal, which involves construing one’s construal as the construal it is. This account of self-insight shows how it exhibits the key characteristics described above.

La notion d'insight joue un rôle important en psychanalyse, étant donné que l'insight est considéré comme le principal moteur du changement psychique au cours d'une thérapie. L'auteur de cet article rend compte d'une forme d'insight particulière, qu'il appelle l'insight de soi (self-insight). L'insight de soi est à la racine de ce que Bell et Leite (2016) ont décrit comme une expérience d'auto-compréhension, un processus où qui voit s'accroître chez l'individu la connaissance de sa vie psychique. Vu sous un tel angle, l'insight de soi possède quatre principales caractéristiques : (1) il est à distinguer d'une connaissance de soi purement intellectuelle, (2) il émane directement de l'expérience du sujet, (3) il englobe un point de vue basé sur l'expérience, et (4) il implique le plus souvent de venir à bout d'une résistance. L'auteur utilise la notion de construction (construal), un état psychique qui est constitutif de l'émotion et qui joue un rôle important dans la motivation. Il considère notamment que l'individu accède à cet insight de soi, lorsqu'il prend conscience via un insight d'une construction auparavant inconsciente, ce qui suppose qu'il soit à même d'analyser cette construction pour ce qu'elle est. Cette description de l'insight de soi rend compte de la façon dont sont mises en œuvre les principales caractéristiques évoquées précédemment.

Einsicht spielt in der Psychoanalyse eine wichtige Rolle, weil sie als entscheidender Vermittler von psychischer Veränderung in der Therapie gilt. In diesem Beitrag erläutere ich eine besondere Art der Einsicht, die ich als “Selbsteinsicht” bezeichne. Selbsteinsicht bildet die Grundlage der von Bell und Leite (2016) beschriebenen erfahrungsgestützten Selbstverständigung, eines Prozesses wachsenden artikulierten Gewahrseins des eigenen Seelenlebens. So verstanden, ist die Selbsteinsicht durch vier Schlüsselmerkmale charakterisiert: (1) Sie unterscheidet sich von einer rein intellektuellen Selbsterkenntnis, (2) erwächst unmittelbar aus der eigenen Erfahrung, (3) enthält eine gelebte Perspektive und (4) setzt häufig das Überwinden von Widerständen voraus. In meiner Erläuterung der Selbsteinsicht stütze ich mich auf das Konzept der Interpretation/Auslegung [construal], eines psychischen Zustandes, der für Emotionen konstitutiv ist und für die Motivation eine wesentliche Rolle spielt. Ich vertrete insbesondere die Ansicht, dass man zur Selbsteinsicht gelangt, wenn man sich einer zuvor unbewussten Interpretation durch Einsicht bewusst wird, d.h. sich bewusst machen kann, dass man die Interpretation als die Interpretation, die sie ist, selbst konstruiert. Diese Darlegung der Selbsteinsicht illustriert die oben beschriebenen charakteristischen Merkmale.

Il concetto di insight è importante in psicoanalisi in quanto di solito si vede in esso il principale agente mediatore del cambiamento psichico nella terapia. Nel presente lavoro descriverò un tipo particolare di insight, a cui ho dato il nome di self-insight. Il self-insight sta alla base di quella che Bell e Leite (2016) chiamano “comprensione di sé” esperienziale, un processo mediante cui la consapevolezza della propria vita mentale aumenta e diventa più articolata. Inteso in questo modo, il self-insight ha quattro caratteristiche principali: (1) è diverso dalla conoscenza di sé puramente intellettuale, (2) emerge direttamente da un’esperienza fatta in prima persona, (3) prevede una prospettiva vissuta, e (4) spesso richiede che vengano superate delle resistenze. La mia descrizione del self-insight fa uso del concetto di costruzione, uno stato mentale costitutivo delle emozioni che svolge anche un ruolo importante nella motivazione. Nello specifico, la mia ipotesi è che si acquisisca self-insight nel momento in cui, tramite un insight, si diventa consapevoli di una costruzione rimasta fino a quel momento inconscia; è questo un processo che vede la persona interessata costruire la sua costruzione nei termini della costruzione che essa è. Questo modo di presentare il self-insight mostra come esso possieda le quattro caratteristiche essenziali sopra menzionate.

El concepto de insight es importante en el psicoanálisis, y es considerado el principal mediador del cambio psíquico en la terapia. En este artículo, el autor da cuenta de un tipo específico de insight, al que llama self-insight (insight sobre el self). El self-insight yace en la base de lo que Bell y Leite (2016) describen como la comprensión experiencial del self, un proceso de creciente articulación de la consciencia de la vida psíquica de uno mismo. Así concebido, el self-insight tiene cuatro características principales: (1) es distinto del mero conocimiento intelectual sobre el self, (2) emerge directamente de la experiencia de primera persona (3) engloba una perspectiva vivenciada, y (4) a menudo requiere superar la resistencia. Este self-insight recurre a la noción de construal, un estado mental constitutivo de la emoción, que desempeña un importante rol en la motivación. De modo específico, se propone que uno alcanza el self-insight al llegar a una consciencia con profundo insight de un construal inconsciente previo, lo que implica construir el construal de uno mismo como el construal que es. Esta presentación del self-insight demuestra cómo este manifiesta las características centrales antes descritas.

KEYWORDS:

• Insight
• self-knowledge
• construal
• belief
• motion
• resistance

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my sincere thanks to Mandel Cabrera, Tim Fuller, and the reviewers of IJP for their helpful comments on drafts of this paper.

Notes

1 Roberts describes unreflective consciousness as “a state of mind in which one is aware of something without noticing being aware of it—so that when one’s attention is called to it, one remembers a kind of peripheral awareness of it” (2003, 320).

2 Roberts does not think the concept of construal is capturable by a set of necessary and sufficient conditions. Instead, following Wittgenstein, he takes a “family resemblance” approach to explicating the concept. Accordingly, he regards paradigmatic cases of construal as involving experiencing something in a certain way, but does not thereby imply that all construals involve experience (cf. Roberts 2003, 69–76).

3 He later drops the epithet “serious” as redundant, though I think it nevertheless serves a useful function.

4 By “unconscious” here I mean (at least) lacking in reflective consciousness. That is, a construal, seeing X as Y, can be unconscious in the relevant sense even if one is conscious of X, as long as one is not conscious of one’s experience of X.

5 This definition should not be taken to imply that one with self-insight necessarily has an articulate conception of construal. Rather, just as in Wittgenstein’s description of the rabbity construal of the duck-rabbit, one can experience one’s construal “something like this,” bringing to mind other construals.

6 These last two examples are drawn from Grosz (2013).

7 Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for this example.

8 Of course, the (second-order) construal that constitutes self-insight may co-occur with a corresponding belief, so that one has a “full-blooded belief” about one’s first-order construal. This can be important to retaining access to one’s self-insight, but it does not affect the fundamental point that what matters vis-à-vis overcoming repression is the (second-order) construal.

9 Here it is worth saying something about unconscious belief, especially in the sense used by Britton in his influential Belief and Imagination (1998). First observe that phantasies, in Britton’s sense, are (in the main) construals. For example, in illustrating his concept of phantasy, Britton speaks of experiencing “hunger pain as a biting object,” “an ideal object as a source of goodness,” and “death as the seductive rescuer” (109–110, 117), all of which are construals. Second, when Britton writes, “the status of belief is conferred on some pre-existing phantasies” (9), I interpret this primarily in terms of verisimilitude, so that what he calls unconscious beliefs may simply be unconscious serious construals, for it is just such construals that can have “emotional and behavioural consequences” (ibid.). However, I do not preclude the existence of unconscious beliefs in a stronger sense—construals to which one has “unconscious epistemic commitment.” These are construals that come with a disposition for one to see the corresponding proposition as true when one is aiming at the truth, but which one prevents oneself from doing (fully) by defensive processes, such as denial.

10 Upon which she can then form other conscious construals, such as feeling “her desire to engage in a particular sort of interpersonal manoeuvre as an urge towards self-debasement” (Bell and Leite 2016, 325).

11 That self-insight does not always require overcoming resistance—it may, for example, involve a moment of maturation or of enlightenment (say, upon reading a Taoist text)—is what renders the concept applicable beyond psychoanalysis.