Sense of self and psychosis, part 2: A single case study on amniotic therapy

Abstract

Some people diagnosed with schizophrenia show an alteration of the sense of self. From a psychodynamic perspective, it has been hypothesized they have disorders of the integration of self/other identification/differentiation processes. From a neuroscientific view some with this diagnosis present dysfunctions in neural correlates of representation of self from other (the implicit sensorimotor-based bodily self), and self united with other. In “Sense of self and psychosis, part 1” we discussed scientific literature offering empirical evidence for the psychodynamic clinical observations that patients with diagnoses of psychoses didn't receive adequate early infancy parental care and sufficient affective-sensorial/tactile interactions. Introducing parental care/cutaneous interactions seemed relevant in the analytic treatment of psychoses, as the pioneers of the psychoanalytic approach to psychosis suggested. From this theoretical basis we developed amniotic therapy, which reproduces the affective-tactile interactions of early infancy, insufficient in cases of psychosis, and aims at integrating the processes of differentiation and identification. We present a single case study of an experimental intervention plan including amniotic therapy. Results showed increases in interoception and global functioning, with significant decreases in positive symptoms suggesting that amniotic therapy contributes to increasing the protective strength of self-boundaries and integration of identification/differentiation processes.

Keywords:

• psychosis
• body self
• affiliative touch
• interoception
• mirror system

Correction Statement

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Additional information

Notes on contributors

Maurizio Peciccia

Maurizio Peciccia is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. He is director of the Gaetano Benedetti Psychoanalytic Existential Institute in Assisi, Italy and also contract professor of dynamic psychology at the Department of Philosophy, Social and Human Science of the University of Perugia. In addition, he is president of the Italian branch of the International Society for the Psychological and Social Approaches to the Psychoses (ISPS).

Alessandro Germani

Alessandro Germani, PhD, is a psychologist and, contract professor of clinical psychology and psychosomatics at the Department of Philosophy, Social Sciences and Education of the University of Perugia, Italy.

Martina Ardizzi

Martina Ardizzi has a PhD in neuroscience and a Master’s degree in neuropsychology. Her main field of interests are: embodied bases of self in healthy individuals and psychiatric patients; the effects of extreme traumatic experiences on autonomic regulation and electrophysiological muscular responses to the facial expression of emotions; the influence of interoceptive signals on autonomic regulation and on interpersonal space representation, both in healthy participants and in psychiatric patients; and neural bases of self–other distinction.

Livia Buratta

Livia Buratta is a psychologist and holds a PhD in human science. She is a research fellow at the University of Perugia, Italy, where since 2008 she has collaborated in several research projects. Her main field of interests are the study of psychological wellbeing throughout the lifespan in nonclinical and clinical populations, and the study of the efficacy and effectiveness of psychological and psychotherapeutic interventions in clinical settings.

Francesca Ferroni

Francesca Ferroni has a Master’s degree in neurobiology and a PhD in neuroscience. Her research focuses on the investigation of bodily self-alterations along the schizotypal and schizophrenic spectrum, on the multisensory integration mechanisms underlying the plasticity of peripersonal space in both schizotypy and schizophrenia, and on the neural bases of the individual differences in peripersonal space plasticity in healthy individuals.

Claudia Mazzeschi

Claudia Mazzeschi, PhD, is a psychologist. She is a full professor of clinical and dynamic psychology at the Department of Philosophy, Social and Human Science of the University of Perugia, Italy, and also the department’s director.

Vittorio Gallese

Vittorio Gallese, MD, is a trained neurologist and professor of psychobiology and cognitive neuroscience at the department of medicine and surgery at the University of Parma, Italy. He is the adjunct senior research scholar, Department of Art History and Archeology, Columbia University, New York, USA, and Einstein Fellow at the Berlin School of Mind and Brain of Humboldt University, Germany. As a cognitive neuroscientist, among his main scientific contributions, together with his colleagues at Parma, is the discovery of mirror neurons, and the proposal of a new model of perception and imagination: embodied simulation theory.

He is the author of more than 300 scientific publications and three books. He has received the following awards and prizes: the Grawemeyer Award for Psychology in 2007; the Doctor Honoris Causa from the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium in 2010; the Arnold Pfeffer Prize for Neuropsychoanalysis in New York in 2010; the Musatti Prize from the Italian Psychoanalytic Society in Milano in 2014; the Kosmos Fellowship from the Humboldt University of Berlin in 2014; and the Einstein Fellowship from the Einstein Stiftung in Berlin in 2016.