metapsychology


Also found in: Dictionary, Wikipedia.

metapsychology

 [met´ah-si-kol´o-je]
the branch of psychology that deals with the theoretical or speculative aspects of a particular subject of psychology, and the significance of mental processes that are beyond empirical verification.

met·a·psy·chol·o·gy

(met'ă-sī-kol'ŏ-jē),
1. A systematic attempt to discern and describe what lies beyond the empiric facts and laws of psychology, such as the relations between body and mind, or concerning the place of the mind in the universe.
2. In psychoanalysis, or psychoanalytic metapsychology, psychology concerning the fundamental assumptions of the freudian theory of the mind, which entails five points of view: 1) dynamic, concerning psychological forces; 2) economic, concerning psychological energy; 3) structural, concerning psychological configurations; 4) genetic, concerning psychological origins; 5) adaptive, concerning psychological relations with the environment.
[G. meta, beyond, transcending, + psychology]

metapsychology

(mĕt′ə-sī-kŏl′ə-jē)
n.
Philosophical inquiry or theory supplementing the empirical science of psychology. Metapsychology deals with aspects of the mind that cannot be evaluated on the basis of objective or empirical evidence.

metapsychology

Fringe psychology
An informal branch of theoretical or speculative psychology that deals with the significance of mental processes; the nature of the mind-body relationship; origin, purpose and structure of the mind; and other nebulous hypotheses beyond the realm of empirical verification.

met·a·psy·chol·o·gy

(met'ă-sī-kol'ŏ-jē)
1. A systematic attempt to discern and describe what lies beyond the empiric facts and laws of psychology, such as the relations between body and mind, or concerning the place of the mind in the universe.
2. psychoanalysis Psychology concerning the fundamental assumptions of the freudian theory of the mind, which entail five points of view: 1) dynamic, concerning psychological forces; 2) economic, concerning psychological energy; 3) structural, concerning psychological configurations; 4) genetic, concerning psychological origins; and 5) adaptive, concerning psychologic relations with the environment.
[G. meta, beyond, transcending, + psychology]
References in periodicals archive ?
His theoretical treatises on 'metapsychology' represent the strictest determinism.
Medard Boss: A Memoir (1973)
As he once left neurology behind, Freud subsequently attempted to leave psychology behind in the interest of forming a new science, that is, psychoanalysis, described as situated "somewhere between philosophy and phenomenology." This move enabled Freud to take on the task of decomposing "myths" relating to good and evil, immortality, and the origins of humanity, by supplanting metaphysics with metapsychology. Freud reasoned that if metaphysics is the study of being and existence, and thus the study of realities separate from matter and lived experience, then metapsychology may be regarded as the parallel study of psychic reality, namely, everything that escapes consciousness and material reality.
Roudinesco, Elizabeth. Freud: His Time and Ours
"Life and death in Freudian metapsychology: a reappraisal of the second instinctual dualism." On Freud's "Beyond the Pleasure Principle".
Death is taking its course: a psychoanalytic reading of Endgame
The Metapsychology of Christopher Bollas: An Introduction
The Metapsychology of Christopher Bollas: An Introduction
(11) See Sigmund Freud, 'The Ego and the Id', On Metapsychology, trans.
Will to truth: adaptation and the uncanny in Simon Stone's The Daughter
On the history of the psychoanalytic movement, papers on metapsych analytic movement, papers on metapsychology, and other works (C.
A theological and psychological provisional definition of narcissism
& trans.), The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud: On the history of the psycho-analytic movement, papers on metapsychology and other works, vol.
The self lost, the self adjusted: forming a new identity in bereavement memoirs by American women
On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis (159-222), Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984.) (In the unconscious, there is no negation, no doubt, no degree in certainty.) There are only desires and desire is always positive.
Emily Dickinson: what is called thinking at the edge of chaos?
The traumatic roots of containment: the evolution of Bion's metapsychology. The Psychoanalysis Quarterly, (79), 935-968.
Abrirse al pensamiento, abrirse al Otro: una reflexion sobre el respeto y la alteridad en Wilfred R. Bion y Emmanuel Levinas
"Notes on the Phantom: A Complement to Freud's Metapsychology." The Shell and The Kernel: Renewals of Psychoanalysis.
A Fragmented Life: Writing Intergenerational Trauma in Morgan Yasbincek's liv
Zizek, Indivisible Remainder, sees Schelling's Freedom essay and Ages of the World drafts as works of materialist metapsychology. Cf.
Late Coleridge and the life of idealism
(44) For Freud's discussion of trauma, see Beyond the Pleasure Principle, in On Metapsychology, Penguin Freud Library 11, ed.
A ghost tour in Rouge
Medical browser ?
Full browser ?