Paradoxical intention

The method of paradoxical intention underlies one of the most effective techniques for combating neuroses. American psychiatrist Viktor Frankl became interested in this phenomenon in the middle of the 20th century, resulting in a fairly simple and effective technique. Its essence is to change your attitude towards fear to a positive one, to expect something terrible with a smile. Unclear? Let's look at an example.

Natalia is afraid to use the elevator. As soon as the elevator doors close, she feels bad - her heart begins to beat strongly and frequently, sweat appears on her forehead, it becomes difficult to breathe and she feels dizzy. She has claustrophobia - one of the most common types of fear neurosis.

What do Natalia's loved ones say?

“Don’t be afraid, they still travel. And I drive, nothing bad happened to me. Give me your hand. Everything will be fine, I’m with you.”

And so on. Effective? Alas, in the case of neurosis this is not always the case.

What does a psychotherapist say when using the method of paradoxical intention?

"You are scared? Show me HOW afraid you are. You say your hands are starting to shake? Show me this please. Yes, yes, show me how much your hands shake.”

Do you see the difference in approaches? When others say “don’t be afraid,” when a person says this to himself, fear intensifies. The psychotherapist does the opposite. He asks to be afraid and even seems to be a little ironic. After the consultation, Natalya, before entering the elevator, will think something like this: “Now I’m about to faint, when I start to tremble!” Incredibly, such escalation of the situation works the other way around, and fear decreases! Of course, the example is very simplified, but the essence of the technique can be understood.

Intentionality in philosophy

What is intention in philosophy? The term originated in scholasticism, a medieval school of philosophy. Thomas Aquinas believed that a subject cannot be known without active intervention in it. Intention and choice are what guide a person’s consciousness and this is a free moral act of will. The German philosopher M. Heidegger included the concept of “care” in the phenomenon of intention, believing that a person cares about his existence. Another German philosopher E. Husserl continued his research on intention and intentionality as a property of consciousness, relying on the work of F. Bretan, and introduced new meanings:

The heart is responsible for the process of cognition of a subject

At a moment of anxiety, the heart directs the attention of consciousness to the object causing the anxious feeling. The subject of study “does not exist” until contemplation of the object or direction of attention to it has occurred.

What does logotherapy give?

Logotherapy has had many followers, but its methodology is not as well developed as, for example, the methodology of Gestalt therapy. This is understandable: the very essence of existential therapy involves a large role for the individual, and the process will look different when performed by different therapists. The concept remains common: serious and paradoxical, romantic and spiritual. It allows you to provide answers to the most difficult questions of human existence:

What gives you the strength to survive trials without losing your human dignity?
Why do people suffer?
How to continue living if there is not much left?
How to listen to yourself and make the right choice?

Of course, these questions concern each of us from time to time. And the answers to them are in the books and works of Viktor Frankl.

Viktor Frankl is an outstanding Austrian psychologist who went through the horrors of a Nazi concentration camp and, like no one else, successfully treated various kinds of phobias. Logotherapy, a branch of existential psychoanalysis founded by Frankl, included effective techniques for working with fears. Paradoxical intention is a method that has at its core a contradictory message or intention regarding the phobia. The patient experiencing fear was asked to want what he was so afraid of - the situation was worked out until a permanent relief from anxious feelings was secured.

Constraints improve efficiency

In a 2022 study, "Organizational Paradox: The Problem Is How We Think About the Problem," published in the Academy of Management Journal, Miron-Spector and her colleagues examined the benefits of paradoxical cognition in one large company.

Employees were asked to describe how often they experienced “resource shortages” at work. Most of them work in this mode 80% of the time - usually there was not enough time and finances. For a minority of the team, the challenge of dealing with limited resources was exhilarating, and they were eager to find new solutions.

Research at Toyota Motor Corporation has shown that its corporate culture is full of paradoxes. An article in the Harvard Business review noted that the company operated under TPS, a “hard” innovation that continually improves the way cars are made. But at the same time, Toyota has mastered the “soft” innovations related to corporate culture. “The company succeeds because it creates contradictions and paradoxes. Employees must work in an environment where they are constantly challenged and forced to come up with fresh ideas. Hard and soft innovations work in tandem,” the authors write.

Paradoxical intention

from Natalia

Almost every person is familiar with fear, anxiety, and worry. One is afraid to speak in front of people because his hands begin to tremble violently; another is afraid to ride in an elevator, believing that he can suffocate there; the third blushes with excitement, turns pale and begins to stutter; the fourth is terrified if he is left alone in the dark.

Paradoxical intention helps to cope with such difficulties - a psychotherapeutic method that was proposed by Alfred Adler and then developed by Viktor Frankl. The term “intention” (from Lat.

intentio - “aspiration”, “attention”) means an internal desire, the focus of consciousness on some object or phenomenon, and “paradoxical” - literally “done the other way around”. The essence of the method is this: instead of running away from unpleasant feelings and the situations that cause them, you need to do the exact opposite, that is, go towards what you fear

The root cause of fear is often a certain incident and the unpleasant experiences associated with it. For example, someone, speaking in front of a large audience, is very worried (as almost everyone is worried) and suddenly notices that his hands are shaking. When he once again has to go to the podium, the fear that his hands will shake again is added to his usual excitement - and this fear comes true. Then the person begins to refuse to perform: he thinks about how his hands will shake again and how he won’t be able to hide it. If fear is not overcome in time, the situation may worsen. This is how a fear of anticipation or phobia is formed, which leads to the fact that the symptom is actually repeated, and as a result, the initial fears are even more intensified. A vicious circle is formed. It will be possible to open it by eliminating the initial fear of waiting.

This is facilitated by paradoxical intention. Frankl told how the parents of a nine-year-old boy turned to a psychotherapist, who, despite all the punishments and reproaches, wet the bed every night. The therapist surprised the child with an unexpected offer: every time the bed was wet, he would receive 50 cents for it. The boy was very pleased, hoping to make money from his disadvantage. But although he did everything possible to receive the award, nothing worked for him. The neurotic symptom disappeared as soon as the desire for its repetition came to the fore.

To apply the method yourself, you need to mentally formulate a paradoxical intention, that is, the desire to do something opposite to what you need to get rid of. Moreover, it is advisable to put your intention in a humorous form. Laughter allows you to look at yourself and your own problems from the outside and thus gain complete control over yourself. This is precisely the main idea of the method.

The “do the opposite” principle turned out to be very fruitful. In particular, paradoxical intention helps when a person cannot fall asleep. An intense desire to achieve a certain emotional state or experience a given feeling - love, pleasure, joy, relaxation, fear - will never lead to the goal. An experience coming from the depths of the psyche, elusive and not amenable to rational explanation, disappears as soon as they stubbornly try to catch it. The same applies to the relaxation that precedes sleep. Typically, those struggling with insomnia make the biggest mistake possible: they lie in wait for sleep.

A person carefully monitors what is happening inside him, but the more he strains his attention, the more difficult it is for him to relax enough to fall asleep. The best way to get rid of insomnia is to forget about sleep for a while and set yourself the goal of staying awake all night

Therapy with meaning

Neurosurgeon and psychotherapist Frankl found his calling early. He was only 20 when he organized a psychological assistance service for students at the University of Vienna. While this service existed, none of them committed suicide.

In the 1930s, Frankl headed the suicide prevention department at a Viennese clinic. When the Nazis came to power, he saved Jews from Hitler's euthanasia program.

In 1942, Frankl's entire family, including himself, was deported to a concentration camp. Only two survived the war - himself and his sister. In the most difficult conditions, Frankl continued, secretly from the SS, to do his life’s work: preventing suicides and helping other prisoners preserve themselves no matter what.

In the book “Saying Yes to Life!”: A Psychologist in a Concentration Camp,” Frankl describes how a person’s inner life changes under unbearable conditions. Hunger and cold, lack of sleep and illness, exhausting work, beatings and bullying, the constant proximity of death made people irritable and indifferent. The prisoners were not afraid to die. Gradually all thoughts were reduced to primitive needs.

“Even the gas chamber does not cause him fear after a few days. In his eyes, it’s just something that takes the worry out of suicide.”

Victor Frankl

from the book “Say Yes to Life!”

In the book, Frankl brings up the idea again and again: even a concentration camp prisoner has a choice. He can try to survive at any cost or fall into final torpor and fold his arms. Or he may fight not to survive, but to continue to live in spite of everything. The image of a loved one and a mental conversation with her, an unfinished business that awaits in freedom, tree trunks illuminated by sunset, helping other prisoners, humor - everything can become a point of spiritual “escape”, a secret life that is not subject to terrible conditions.

Frankl quickly discovered that the question “will we survive here” is not as meaningful as another question: “does our suffering have meaning?” Because if they don’t make sense, then there’s no point in surviving. To remain human means to find this meaning and maintain the aspirations that are associated with it.

This is what psychologist Viktor Frankl discovered and tested under extreme conditions. Logotherapy means “therapy with meaning.”

Intention in psychology

Psychology is a science that emerged from philosophy and continues to share many fundamental concepts with it. Intention in psychology is a mental phenomenon of direction or focusing of consciousness on a particular object. By studying external reality, a person correlates this with his internal experiences and ideas, building a chain of relationships with the world. Franz Bretano, Austrian psychologist and philosopher of the 19th century. While exploring the phenomenon of intention, I highlighted the following points:

Consciousness is always objective and relates to any things real or imaginary.
Comprehension of an object occurs on an emotional level, in the form of recollection of subjective knowledge about an object with real experience, and comparison with generally accepted axioms.
Conclusion: a person’s internal perception of a phenomenon or object is more true than the external one, based on the opinions of many.

How to write a term paper on speech therapy

07.09.2010 257494

These guidelines are compiled to help students gain an understanding of the content and structure of coursework in speech therapy.

Logopedia of pedagogical science that studies anomalies of speech development with normal hearing, explores the manifestations, nature and mechanisms of speech disorders, develops the scientific basis for overcoming and preventing them means of special training and education.

The subject of speech therapy as a science is speech disorders and the process of training and education of persons with speech disorders.

The object of study is a person suffering from a speech disorder.

The main task of speech therapy as a science is the study, prevention and elimination of various types of speech disorders.

Coursework in speech therapy is a student's scientific and experimental research. This type of educational activity, provided for by the educational and professional program and curriculum, contributes to the acquisition of skills in working with literature, analyzing and summarizing literary sources in order to determine the range of insufficiently studied problems, determining the content and methods of experimental research, processing skills and qualitative analysis of the results obtained. The need to complete coursework in speech therapy is due to the updating of knowledge concerning the content, organization, principles, methods and techniques of speech therapy work.

As a rule, during their studies, students must write two term papers - theoretical and practical.

The first course work should be devoted to the analysis and synthesis of general and specialized literature on the chosen topic. Based on this analysis, it is necessary to justify and develop a method of ascertaining (diagnostic) experiment.

In the second course work, it is necessary to provide an analysis of the results obtained during the ascertaining experiment, as well as determine the directions and content of speech therapy work, and select adequate methods and techniques of correction.

So, let’s present the general requirements for the content and design of coursework in speech therapy.

The initial and most important stage of working on a course project is the choice of a topic, which is either proposed by the supervisor or chosen by the student independently from a list of topics that are consistent with the areas of scientific research of the department.

Each topic can be modified, considered in different aspects, but taking into account a theoretical and practical approach. Having chosen a topic, the student needs to think through in detail its specific content, areas of work, practical material, etc., which should be reflected both in the formulation of the topic and in the further construction of the study. It should be recalled that the chosen topic may not only have a purely theoretical orientation, for example: “Dysarthria. Characteristics of the defect”, “Classification of dysgraphia”, but also take into account the practical significance of the problem under consideration, for example: “Speech therapy work on speech correction for dysarthria”. It should also be taken into account that when formulating a topic, excessive detail should be avoided, for example: “Formation of prosodic components of speech in preschoolers of the sixth year of life attending a preschool institution for children with severe speech impairments.”

The course work includes such mandatory parts as: introduction, three chapters, conclusion, bibliography and appendix.

The text of the term paper begins with the title page . An example of its design can be seen here.

Then the content of the work is given, in which the names of chapters, paragraphs, and sections are formulated in strict accordance with the content of the thesis. An example of its design can be seen here.

In the text, each subsequent chapter and paragraph begins on a new page. At the end of each chapter, the materials are summarized and conclusions are formulated.

The introduction reveals the relevance of the problem under consideration in general and the topic being studied in particular; the problem, subject, object, and purpose of the study are defined. In accordance with the goal and hypothesis, objectives and a set of research methods aimed at achieving the objectives must be defined.

The relevance of the topic lies in reflecting the current level of pedagogical science and practice, meeting the requirements of novelty and usefulness.

When defining the research problem, it is important to indicate what practical tasks it will help to implement in training and educating people with speech pathology.

The object of research is understood as certain aspects of pedagogical reality, perceived through a system of theoretical and practical knowledge. The ultimate goal of any research is to improve this object.

The subject of research is some part, property, element of an object, i.e. the subject of research always indicates a specific aspect of the object that is to be studied and about which the researcher wants to gain new knowledge. An object is a part of an object.

You can give an example of the formulation of the object, subject and problem of research:

– The object of the study is the speech activity of preschool children with phonetic-phonemic speech disorders.

– The subject of the study is the features of intonation speech of children with phonetic-phonemic speech disorders.

– The research problem is to determine effective directions for speech therapy work on the formation of intonation expressiveness of speech in the system of correctional intervention.

The purpose of the study contributes to the specification of the object being studied. The goal of any research is to solve a specific problem. The goal is specified in tasks taking into account the subject of research.

The research objectives are formulated in a certain sequence, which determines the logic of the research. The research objectives are set on the basis of a theoretical analysis of the problem and an assessment of the state of its solution in practice.

The first chapter is an analysis of literary sources, which examines the state of this problem in historical and modern aspects, and presents the most important theoretical principles that formed the basis of the study.

When writing the first chapter, you should pay attention to the fact that the text of the course work must be written in a scientific style. When presenting scientific material, it is necessary to comply with the following requirements:

– Specificity – a review of only those sources that are necessary to disclose only a given topic or solve only a given problem;

– Clarity – which is characterized by semantic coherence and integrity of individual parts of the text;

– Logicality – which provides for a certain structure of presentation of the material;

– Reasoning – evidence of thoughts (why this and not otherwise);

– Precision of wording, excluding ambiguous interpretation of the authors’ statements.

A literary review of the state of the problem being studied should not be reduced to a consistent presentation of literary sources. It should present a generalized description of the literature: highlight the main directions (currents, concepts, points of view), analyze in detail and evaluate the most fundamental works of representatives of these directions.

When writing a work, the student must correctly use literary materials, make references to the authors and sources from which the results of scientific research are borrowed. Failure to provide required references will reduce your coursework grade.

As a rule, in coursework on speech therapy, references to literary sources are formatted as follows: the number of the cited source in the general list of references is placed in square brackets. For example: General speech underdevelopment is a speech pathology in which there is a persistent lag in the formation of all components of the language system: phonetics, vocabulary and grammar [17].

When using quotations, in square brackets, in addition to indicating the source number, the page number from which this excerpt is taken is indicated, for example: Speech rhythm is based on a physiological and intellectual basis, since, firstly, it is directly related to the rhythm of breathing. Secondly, being an element that performs a communicative function, “correlates with meaning, i.e. controlled intellectually” [23, P.40].

However, course work should not be of a purely abstract nature, so you should not abuse the unreasonable abundance of citations. Quoting should be logically justified, convincing and used only when really necessary.

In the second chapter , devoted to experimental research, the organization should be described and the program of the ascertaining experiment should be presented. The survey methodology, as a rule, consists of a description of several series of tasks, with detailed instructions, visual and lexical material, the procedure for completing tasks by experiment participants, and scoring criteria. This chapter also provides a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the results obtained.

When analyzing the results of an experiment, it is necessary to use a scoring system. Examples of various criteria for quantitative and qualitative assessment are presented in the following works:

– Glukhov V.P. Formation of coherent speech in preschool children with general speech underdevelopment. - M.: Arkti, 2002. - 144 p.

– Fotekova T.A. Test methodology for diagnosing oral speech of primary schoolchildren. - M.: Arkti, 2000. - 56 p.

– Levchenko I.Yu. Pathopsychology: Theory and practice. - M.: Academy, 2000. - 232 p.

In order to visually present the results obtained during the experimental study, it is recommended to use tables, graphs, diagrams, etc. Histograms can be used in a variety of ways - columnar, cylindrical, planar, volumetric, etc. An example of the design of tables, figures, and histograms can be found here.

The third chapter provides a rationale for the proposed methods and techniques and reveals the content of the main stages of correctional work.

The conclusion contains a summary of the material presented and the main conclusions formulated by the author.

The bibliography must contain at least 25 sources. The list includes bibliographic information about the sources used in preparing the work. An example of its design can be seen here.

In the application you can present bulky tables or illustrations, examination protocols, observation records, products of activity (drawings, written works of children), notes from speech therapy classes, etc.

The volume of one course work must be at least 30 pages of typewritten text.

In general, coursework in speech therapy is the basis for a future thesis, in which the study of the begun problem can be continued, but from the standpoint of a different approach or a comparative analysis of the disorders being studied in different age categories of people with different types of speech disorders.

The content and format of theses in speech therapy can be found here.

Literature:

1. How to write a term paper on speech therapy: Methodological recommendations. Educational and methodological manual / Comp. Artemova E.E., Tishina L.A. / Ed. Orlova O.S. – M.: MGOPU, 2008. – 35 p.

2. Research work of students in the system of higher professional pedagogical education (specialty 031800 - Speech therapy). Methodological recommendations for completing the thesis / Compiled by. L.V. Lopatina, V.I. Lipakova, G.G. Golubeva. - St. Petersburg: Publishing house of the Russian State Pedagogical University named after. A. I. Herzen, 2002. - 140 p.

Paradoxical intention - stuttering

Fear of pronouncing words is a common cause of stuttering. A person is afraid to speak because stuttering is inevitable in his mind. Intentionality of consciousness can help move the fear of stuttering from emotional contexts to the realm of meaning. Provocative (paradoxical) technique for working with stuttering:

The patient is asked to stutter as hard as possible: “I’m about to start stuttering, no one has ever stuttered so much before me, I’m the very best stuttering champion, now everyone will hear...” Attention switches to logic. If the patient is afraid of stuttering - he stutters, as soon as he begins to strongly desire to stutter - the speech disorder goes away.

Vicious circle of phobias

Personal fears can accompany us throughout our lives if we ourselves reinforce them.

For example, someone is afraid of blushing when speaking in public or in an argument (erythrophobia). Anticipation of an unwanted symptom and excessive efforts to avoid it lead to redness. What a person fears happens.

And the more we fear the appearance of a symptom, the higher the likelihood that it will appear. Over time, the fear intensifies due to his “invincibility.” But we continue to believe in deliverance and hope that one day he will retreat.

The circle closes:

fear of a symptom;
the presence of fear inside and its implementation outside;
disappointment and a new desire to fight;
fear of recurrence of symptoms;
increase in fear and repetition of the symptom.

Phobia gives rise to avoidant behavior. A person with claustrophobia avoids using the elevator, and an agoraphobe (agoraphobia - fear of open spaces) or social phobia does not leave the house for weeks.

Communicative intention as a variant of logotherapy

Another type of goal setting as a form of psychotherapeutic influence. This type of logotherapy is based on intention, design and on the construction of a communicative utterance in this form in a monological and/or dialogical style. Examples of communicative intentions include statements, questions, as well as demands, approval or censure. At the same time, the reflection of needs, thoughts and motives for action makes the reasons that determine this communication process clearly expressed (explicit).

When sending a thought or intention from one participant in a dialogue to another, the initiator of the dialogue has the intention of exerting some influence on the interlocutor. And for this, the one who listens to the speaker must clearly grasp the meaning of the outgoing information, and what final reaction is expected from him.

When a logotherapist uses his influence on a patient, he sends him his mental instructions in speech form and expects him to respond directly to his message. Ultimately, this is the goal of psychotherapeutic influence.

The concept of “speech awareness” is needed to realize a person’s intention to express a meaning that is significant in communications during the speech process.

The main interpretation of the word under discussion is used not only in psychology and/or psychotherapy. This is a widely used term in philosophy and religion, as well as in medicine, in particular in neurology. In the listed areas of human comprehension, the meaning of this concept, if it changes, is only within a slight range.

So, for example, the scholastics spoke of this as the direction of the consciousness and will of the individual towards some object. The works of F. Brentano and A. Meyong were devoted to the development of this concept

Obsessive thoughts (obsessions)

This method is also suitable for obsessive thoughts One lawyer became convinced that when he filled out his tax return, he hid part of his taxes, although this was not the case. He could not get rid of this thought and expected to be arrested. He also could not continue to work and was depressed for several months by obsessions. Until he stopped resisting them.

His intention looked like this: “Yes, I’m wrong! Damn perfection! Let them put me behind bars soon!” At the appointment, the doctor greeted the man with the words: “What’s going on? Are you still walking around free?" Laughter relieved tension and soon the lawyer was freed from obsession, although before treatment with the Frankl method he was forced to stay in a psychiatric clinic.

The concept of paradoxical intention

What is paradoxical intention? This approach to psychoanalytic support, we recall, was recommended by Viktor Frankl in 1927 and is triumphantly used by psychoanalysts today.

Logotherapy using the method of paradoxical orientation involves working with the patient’s phobia, in which, at the moment of a critical peak, he maximizes or even initiates the phobia with the aim of maximizing its existence here and now.

For example, with claustrophobia (fear of closed spaces), patients are asked to enter a cramped enclosed space and, having felt their emotions, understand that this is only agitation and there is no real threat to the life or health of the person himself. That is, fear is simply an experience, albeit of an extreme degree of tension. At the same time, the intention is the very expectation and fear of this emotion and the vegetative reactions that it provokes.

The method of paradoxical orientation is the main way to influence the mechanism of the birth of a feeling of horror and work through it through direct contact with it. In contrast to the usual desire to escape from the emotion of extreme tension, the patient experiences it and gains invaluable experience in regulating his response experiences.

To summarize, let's say that paradoxical nー is one of the powerful and numerous methods of influencing an individual used in psychotherapy.

Theory of neuroses

Karen Horney's theory of neurosis is one of the most famous theories in this area of psychology. Horney believed that interpersonal relationships create basic anxiety, and neurosis is a kind of defense mechanism to cope with it. The psychologist divided neurotic needs into three large groups, and therefore three types of neurotic personality are distinguished - helpless, aggressive and isolated.

A balanced and well-adapted person successfully uses all three lines of behavior. A person becomes neurotic if one of them dominates.

Addiction

Neurosis of this type forces a person to constantly strive for the help and approval of others, confirmation by other people of his own rightness; only in this case does he feel valuable and significant. Such people need to be liked by others, to feel their sympathy, as a result of which they often become overly intrusive and emotionally dependent.

Power and control

Striving for high self-esteem, people try to reduce feelings of anxiety by imposing their power and trying to strictly control others. People with these needs appear to others as unkind, selfish, power-hungry, and control-obsessed. Horney argued that people project their hostility onto others through a mental process the psychologist called externalization, and then make excuses for their violent behavior.

Isolation

Neurosis of this type leads to antisocial behavior; To those around him, such a person seems indifferent and indifferent. This line of behavior is based on the idea that limiting contact with other people will avoid danger and moderate anxiety. The result is usually a feeling of emptiness and loneliness.

Within these three groups of neuroses, Horney identified ten neurotic needs:

- Addiction

1. The need for love and approval - the desire to meet the expectations of others at all costs, to give them pleasure, to make them satisfied and happy, to please them. People with this need are very afraid of hostility or anger from other people and are extremely sensitive to criticism and rejection.

2. The need for a leadership partner who will control his life. This need involves a strong fear of the prospect of being abandoned and forgotten and the belief that a permanent partner will help solve any problems that may arise in life.

— Power and control

1. The need for power. People with this need control others and try to dominate because they hate weakness and admire strength.

2. Need for operation. People with such tendencies manipulate others. They are convinced that others exist only to use them. Connections and relationships with the rest of the world, from their point of view, are needed only in order to have control, sex or money.

3. The need for prestige. These people strive for public recognition and approval. Social status, material wealth, professional achievements, personal qualities, and even family ties and love relationships are assessed in terms of prestige. These people have a strong fear of negative public opinion.

4. The need for personal achievement. The desire to succeed is a completely normal quality. But a neurotic can become obsessed with this idea, and his desire for achievement is based on a feeling of insecurity. He is terribly afraid of failure, so he always needs to be better than others.

5. Need for admiration. Such people are characterized by narcissism, the desire to look ideal in the eyes of others - just to look, and not to actually be.

— Isolation

1. The need for perfection. A person with such a neurosis is usually very afraid of his shortcomings and flaws and constantly tries to identify them in order to hide or get rid of them as quickly as possible.

2. The need for independence. In an effort not to depend on other people and not to be attached, a person often distances himself from the people around him. This leads to the formation of a “loner” mentality.

3. The need for life restrictions that allow you to remain within narrow limits. People who feel this need try to remain invisible and attract as little attention to themselves as possible. They usually underestimate their skills and talents, do not demand much from others, do not strive for material wealth, are content with very little and consider their needs and wants to be secondary.

Karen Horney's ideas have had a huge influence on modern psychology. Her theory of neuroses as a mechanism for relieving anxiety and the classification of neurotic needs made a real breakthrough in science. And thanks to her strong rejection of the ideas of Sigmund Freud, based on the superiority of the male sex over the female, Horney earned a reputation as a defender of gender equality and a recognized master in the field of female psychology.

Literature

Hertz G. O.
Treatment by the method of paradoxical intention //
Frankl V.
The will to meaning. - M.: Eksmo, 2000. - 368 p. — (Psychological collection). — 5,000 copies. — ISBN 5-04-005753-9.
Frankl V.
Paradoxical intention // Suffering from the meaninglessness of life: Current psychotherapy = Das Leiden am sinnlosen Leben: Psychotherapy für heute. — Novosibirsk: Sib. Univ. publishing house, 2011. - pp. 49-57. — 105 s. - (Ways of Philosophy). — 3,000 copies. — ISBN 978-5-379-01751-4.
Frankl V.
Theory and therapy of neuroses // Man in search of meaning: Collection. - M.: Progress, 1990. - P. 340-350. — 368 p. — (Library of Foreign Psychology). — 136,000 copies. — ISBN 5-01-001606-0.

Bibliography

Frankl, Victor Beacon Press, Boston, MA, 2006. ISBN 978-0-8070-1427-1
Frankl, Victor (12 October 1986). The Doctor and the Soul: From Psychotherapy to Logotherapy
. Random House Digital, Inc. ISBN 978-0-394-74317-2. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
Frankl, Victor Simon & Schuster, New York, 1967. ISBN 0-671-20056-9
Frankl, Victor New American Library, New York, 1988 ISBN 0-452-01034-9
Frankl, Victor Simon and Schuster, New York, 2011 ISBN 978-1-4516-6438-6
Frankl, Victor Brunner-Routledge, London-New York, 2004. ISBN 0-415-95029-5
Frankl, Victor Autobiography, Basic Books, Cambridge, MA, 2000. ISBN 978-0-7382-0355-3.
Frankl, Victor Perseus Publishing, New York, 1997; ISBN 978-0-7382-0354-6.

Peculiarities

The use of this technique is based on the specifically human ability to detach, which underlies the sense of humor. This important ability to detach from oneself is activated whenever the logotherapeutic technique of paradoxical intention is used. In this case, the patient also gains the ability to distance himself from his neurosis. Gordon Allport writes: “The neurotic who learns to laugh at himself is on the path to self-control and perhaps recovery.” Paradoxical intention provides empirical support and clinical application of Allport's statement.

Paradoxical intention does not depend on the etiological basis in each specific case. Edith Weiskopf-Jelson states: “ Although traditional psychotherapy insists that therapeutic procedures should be based on identifying etiology, it is quite possible that in early childhood neuroses may be caused by one cause, and in adulthood by completely different ones.”

».

Basic Concepts

According to Frankl, logotherapy is based on three concepts: free will, the will to meaning, and the meaning of life. The concept of logotherapy asserts that the driving force of human behavior is the desire to find and realize the meaning of life

. One of the key human properties, according to Frankl, is the will to meaning.

, which Frankl contrasted with the Adlerian striving for superiority, self-affirmation aimed at compensating for an inferiority complex and the Freudian pleasure principle. Frankl believed that the desire for meaning is a fundamental motivational force in humans, and that what people need is not a stress-free state, but an intense pursuit of some meaning that is worthy of them. When the desire for meaning is frustrated, apathy and boredom arise.

The state of a person when his desire for meaning is frustrated, according to Frankl, is called an existential vacuum

, about which existentialist philosophers wrote. An existential vacuum, according to logotherapy, can lead to noogenic neurosis (neurosis that arises as a result of frustration of the desire for meaning), clinical symptoms.

In the 1950s and 1960s, Frankl noted the widespread loss of meaning in life. According to the statistics he cited, the incidence of depression, drug addiction, alcoholism is increasing, and aggression is also increasing

Unlike Freud, who believed that aggression was generated by suppressed sexual instincts, Frankl also considered the lack of meaning in life to be an important cause of aggression. In his opinion, alcoholics and drug addicts are people who have no meaning in life or have lost it, experiencing an existential vacuum, internal emptiness, meaninglessness of existence

From Frankl’s point of view, meaning is not something purely subjective - a person does not invent it, but finds it in the world around him. Frankl names three ways by which a person can make his life meaningful:

creation;
gaining new experience or meeting someone along the path of life;
finding meaning in life, including suffering.

Frankl emphasizes that the third path - the path of finding meaning in suffering - should be used only if the first two are not available. Frankl discovered the third way while in a concentration camp during the Holocaust, and this way helped him endure terrible torment. In his book, Frankl gives this example of finding meaning in suffering:

Method of paradoxical intention

Frankl's method - paradoxical intention (contradictory intention) - is a meaningful, intentional desire not to fight a situation or event that causes fear, not to resist it, but, on the contrary, to desire what you are afraid of.

For example, a person’s palms become sweaty, just at the moment when they want to shake hands with him - and he, of course, is afraid of this.

A vicious circle arises - “fear of fear,” that is, the fear of getting sweat on another person’s hand, causing the fear that the palms will sweat when shaking hands.

The essence of the method of paradoxical intention is not to avoid the situation of shaking hands, and not to fight fear, but, on the contrary, to allow your palms to sweat even more.

Those. Before shaking hands, say to yourself, for example: “Before, my palms secreted 50 grams of sweat, now let them secrete a liter.”

After several repetitions, the fear will disappear, the vicious circle will break, which means your palms will no longer sweat.

The difference between intention and desire

To correctly understand what intention is, it is important to learn to distinguish it from desire. Desire is a person’s attraction to something, based on simple instincts, the desire for pleasure or satisfaction. Intention is a desire that has a certain plan, intention, strategy of action. For example, if a person wants to have his own home, this is a desire. But when a plan is built around this desire (to save the required amount, buy a plot of land and build a house with certain characteristics), it turns into an intention.

Thus, intention has two main differences from desire:

It represents a certain plan of action (not just a desire to get something, but an intention to get it in a certain way).
It is more specific (not just satisfying a need, but satisfying it in a certain form).

For example, “I want a car” is a simple desire. But “I’ll buy a used car, learn to drive, then buy a specific model” - this is already an intention. A person understands what he is striving for, plans his actions and specifies the final goal. Similarly, the phrase “I want housing” is a desire, and the reasoning “I’ll save money, buy a plot in the village and build a house with a swimming pool and a library” is already a specific and purposeful intention.

About dogs in the theory of change

Perls, who harshly criticized existing approaches and psychologists, began to study and develop the idea in practice. He accused them of “slipping dogs to people.”

“Dog from below” is how a psychologist funnyly called a situation when a joyful psychologist immediately tries to change a client, seeing only this as an opportunity for him. He pushes him towards some kind of “correct, healthy” image, which is impossible without finding internal consistency.

The psychologist takes the position of an expert, belittling the client, and true harmony is in relation to equal people.

“Dog on top” is the client’s attempt to make the psychologist fit his expectations and stereotypes, which gives rise to conflict. After all, a competent therapist, according to the theory, is a specialist who remains himself in any life situation, and can only change by maintaining this sense of self.