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J Küchenhoff

Publications and source records attributed to J Küchenhoff.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1996

[Unfulfilled desire for children in the man: coping and pain. Results of a psychosomatic-andrologic cooperative study].

115 andrological patients were studied with psychological self-assessment tests to assess both their motivation concerning parenthood, and their own explanations for the causes. Additionally self-esteem was evaluated in 51 patients. The main results were: Motivation concerning parenthood is of greater importance in coping with involuntary childlessness than objective andrological data. Patients assess their situation quite realistically; no tendency to misinterpret the medical data in order to defend negative feelings and to protect self-esteem could be found. Most patients with reduced fertility consider this situation a challenge and are willing to mobilize resources and the help of others in order to cope. Self-esteem was only threatened in those patients with longlasting unvoluntary childlessness and little acceptance of medical infertility treatment and parenting substitutes, e.g. adopting a child.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1996

Psychological factors in the diagnosis and pathogenesis of stiff-man syndrome.

Retrospective psychological evaluation of nine patients with stiff-man syndrome (SMS), seven of whom evidenced autoimmune disease, revealed a characteristic set of psychological symptoms or features: Major stressful life events preceded the development of permanent symptoms by 6 months or less (seven patients); transient motor symptoms occurred in emotionally distressing situations months or even years before the onset of a permanent motor deficit (five patients); after onset, similar situations specifically precipitated or augmented stiffness and spasms (five patients). We also found task-specific fear resembling agoraphobia (six patients) and loss or invalidation of one or both parents, or loss of home, in childhood (seven patients). Eight patients were initially misdiagnosed as having psychogenic movement disorder. We conclude that the common misdiagnosis of SMS as a psychogenic movement disorder is due to the compelling association of a set of salient psychological features, bizarre and fluctuating motor symptoms, and lack of approved neurologic signs.

Adult↗
PubMed1996

[Theory and practice of psychodynamic supervision in psychiatry].

Supervision has become a canonical part of psychotherapeutic training. Supervision has been increasingly introduced into general psychiatric treatment, especially where the team is subjected to increased psychological stress. Some psychodynamic models of the functioning of team supervision in psychiatry are presented, esp. support of the team's "synthetic functions" and the use of "mirror phenomena". Case vignettes drawn from supervisory sessions may help to illustrate the models. Finally the institutional prerequisites for establishing team supervision are pointed out.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed1996

[The role of biography in psychoanalysis].

The construction of biographical data by the analyst and the remembrance of the past by the patient were regarded as vital for the psychoanalytic cure by Freud. Today the working-through of the transference in the actual therapeutic relationship is regarded as much more important. Whether the past is constructed or reconstructed, whether past events can explain present experiences etc., these questions are discussed not only in psychoanalysis, but also in the historical sciences and in philosophy. The dialogue with these can offer new insights into the relation of past to present, the importance of narrativity etc. to psychoanalysis; at the same time by comparison psychoanalysis can define its proper and specific approach to biography more clearly. These specific methods include the intersubjectivity of psychoanalytic experience in general and of reconstruction of the past, particularly, and the psychoanalytic process of remembering that leads to a differentiation of presence and past. Psychoanalysis is no psychosynthesis; it de-constructs experience, whereas the synthesis of the past is left to the patient's synthetic functions.

Freudian Theory↗
PubMed1995

[Structure and structural disorder].

One of the central tasks of psychodynamic diagnosis, next to determining intrapsychic conflicts, central relational patterns, and subjective forms of experiencing is assessing the psychic structure or the structural disorder. This article develops the structure term from object relationship theoretical, ego-psychological, and self-psychological concepts of psychoanalysis. This "Structure of the self in the relationship to others" thus obtained is described with six structural criteria (self-perception, self-control, defence, object perception, communication, attachment). In order to be able to distinguish the extent and the quality of structural disorders four structure levels of integration based on psychoanalytic experience in the out-patient and the in-patient setting are differentiated. A basis for an operationalization is then made; it is made in the system OPD (Operationalized Psychodynamic Diagnostics). First studies regarding practicalibility and reliability are promising.

Communication↗
PubMed1995

[What modifies the course of Crohn disease?].

This paper presents empirical results concerning the interdependency of somatic and psychological factors in the course of Crohn's disease. Data derived from the Heidelberg psychosomatic study on Crohn's disease are explored with the help of canonical correlation analysis. Somatic data recorded in the acute stage of Crohn's disease were not empirically found to be predictive of the psychological status after convalescence empirically. On the other hand, we did find psychological data that allowed prediction of the somatic status when the patients were in remission. Of these psychological data, coping resources are the most important predictors of the course of the disease. In particular, depressive forms of coping are correlated with personality factors, whereas active coping forms are not. The results have implications for scientific theory as well as for clinical practice.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1995

[Bio-psychosocial interactions in follow-up of Crohn disease].

The bio-psycho-social model serves as a guideline to the presentation of the main results of a longitudinal study of Crohn's disease (Heidelberg research project on Crohn's disease). The interactions and interrelations of the biological, psychological and social dimension during a 3 years' course of the disease are presented; in addition, the psychological data based on different theoretical concepts are compared to and linked with each other (defense/coping; disease concepts/personality and coping). Conclusions are drawn in respect to the biopsychosocial research on Crohn's disease and, more generally, to bio-psycho-social research designs and research methodology.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1994

[Specificity models in psychosomatic medicine: review of an old controversy].

The assumption that specific factors of personality or unconscious conflict are causative factors in psychosomatic diseases was a guiding concept in psychosomatic medicine for a long time. An early paper of F. Alexander written in 1934 and a series of papers on the problem of specificity published in 1958 serve as examples to bring this important issue back to memory. The original problem seems to have been solved by exchanging specificity models by models of interaction of multiple factors and of multifactorial constellations. It is argued that the debate on specificity in psychosomatic medicine has implicitly been a debate on the scientific status of the psychoanalytic approach in psychosomatic medicine, and that these methodological issues are still vital to psychosomatic medicine.

Humans↗
PubMed1992

[Some dimensions of the forgotten body in psychoanalysis and psychosomatic medicine].

Bodily Experience is well reflected in psychoanalysis and psychosomatic medicine, the body is not forgotten. The first part of the paper summarizes the general and clinical knowledge on bodily experience. The second part deals with some still neglected dimensions of bodily experience. The first two dimensions are clinical perspectives. 1. The (ill) body can be functionalized as a help to stabilize fragile body boundaries. 2. The body is determined not only by intrapsychic conflicts but also by social influences, so that bodily behavior might not necessarily reflect intrapsychic attitudes but social (hyper-)adaptation. The following two dimensions may be important for psychosomatic research. 3. Causal and unidirectional models of body-soul influences lack complexity and should be replaced by differentiated interactional models. 4. Empirical studies on body experience have to take into account its subjective and unconscious character. Qualitative methods might be very helpful here.

Body Image↗
PubMed1992

[The communicative function of psychogenic physical disorders].

The goal of the present paper is to give a classification of psychosomatic theories on symbolic body functioning by applying two modern semiotic theories (Peirce, de Saussure). Hysterical symptoms have been regarded since Freud as symbolizations through the body. Psychovegetative disorders are symbolic representations of pre-oedipal conflicts at the level of M. Balint's basic faults. Psychosomatic symptoms in alexithymic patients cannot be regarded as symbolic; these patients, however, exert a form of negative communication that can be understood as a last resort prior to (psychotic) decompensation. It therefore seems necessary to differentiate which patients can best be described by which semiotic model.

Humans↗
PubMed1991

[Theory and methods of clinical assessment of defense mechanisms].

Originally, defense theories had been developed as metapsychological categories. Applied to empirical investigations, however, defense theories have to be adapted to the specific empirical design. A clinical and an empirical theory on defense, for which the same terms are often used, are by no means identical. The clinical and empirical terms have to be matched. An empirical theory on defense should correspond not only to metapsychological categories but be adequate for the research object. Among the most common empirical procedures, clinical ratings of defense mechanisms come closest to clinical judgements, but entail methodological problems. Group ratings underly dynamic group processes which are difficult to control and thus imply a risk. The advantage of such a rating, however, is that affective processes within the rating team may be seen as an extended observational instrument. Despite their methodological restrictions, consensus ratings may be seen as an instrument the further development of which is worthwhile.

Crohn Disease↗
PubMed1990

[Edgar Degas, photography and voyeurism].

Degas has drawn his paintings in a voyeuristic perspective. This voyeurism is not due to the painter's personal psychopathology. Instead, Degas has recognized the voyeuristic change of visual perception as a result of the development of photography as a new medium; meanwhile this change has become unconscious. Degas' paintings thus confront us with the historicity of visual perception and of the visual partial instinct.

Body Image↗
PubMed1989

[Against premature facilitation of clinico-hermeneutic and theoretical scientific empirical aspects. Comments on W. Tress, research on psychogenic diseases between clinico-hermeneutic and theoretical scientific empirical aspects: social empirical markers as mediators].

The paper presented here is a contribution to the debate on the methodological dualism of hermeneutical and nomothetical procedures in psychotherapy and psychotherapeutic research. Recently, W. Tress has made re-commendations to mediate between both spheres by applying so-called "socio-empirical markers". This concept is criticized. Rather than precipitately mediating between clinical hermeneutics and empirical nomology, a critical differentiation of both methodologies is advocated. The inter-methodological dialog is furthered best by supporting hermeneutical methodology which has been devaluated in present day psychotherapy research. Recommendations to enhance the application of hermeneutics in psychoanalytic psychotherapy are given.

Communication↗