Neurosis & Treatment: A Holistic Theory Chapter 4    

Andras Angyal

 

4. Integration and Its Disturbances

 

The Structure of Wholes

 

For a holistic study of personality we need logical tools adequate for dealing with the structure of wholes.  We need, in fact, a new type of logic, a logic of holistic systems, which would be the counterpart of the conventional logic of relations.  This is a larger order and a task for the future.  As a first step in this direction I shall try to clarify some of the logical properties of systems and to apply the insight gained to the problem of personality integration.  In the following discussion the term system denotes holistic organization, while the term whole refers to the concrete organized object.

 

In order to demonstrate some of the logical characteristics of systems I shall compare them with relationships, using as an example of a system a static, geometrical one: a straight line A-B containing points a, b, c, d.  The essential differences between relationships and system may be summarized in the following four points.

 

1. A relation requires two and only two members (relata) between which the relation is established.  A system may involve any number of members and is not analyzable into pairs of relata; it is not a complex relation.  In our example it is impossible to say what the relation between the points a and b, b and c, c and d should be in order to make them form a linear system.  If a formulation involving a multitude of members-e.g. a casual chain e-f-g-I-can easily be resolved into two-term relations, e-f, f-g, g-I, we are dealing with a compound relation and not with a system.

 

2. In a relationship, the connection of the relata is direct, going without any mediation from a to b and vice versa.  Between the members of a system, the connections are of a more complex type.  The points a, b, c, d of a straight line is connected only in that they form a linear whole.  The members of a system as such are not significantly connected with each other except with reference to the whole.  Their relationships to each other are secondary; they are determined by a super-ordinate factor.

 

3. A relation requires an aspect out of which the relationship is formed.  For instance, the relations of identity, difference, or similarity between two objects may be based on their color, size, or weight, i.e., on some immanent attribute.  This does not hold for systems.  Items become constituents of the system by means of their distribution or arrangement, by their positional value in the system and not by their immanent qualities.  In a linear system it is immaterial whether points, crosses, or circles are its members as long as the positional values in the arrangement remain the same.  We may transpose a melody a few octaves higher or lower and it still remains essentially the same melody, although the two variations may not have a single individual tone in common.  That the whole is, to a large extent, independent of individual parts has been frequently pointed out.

 

This statement, however, needs some qualifications.  The parts have to have certain attributes to enable them to fill the positions required by the system.  In a triangle the parts have to be lines, although their other properties (for instance, their absolute lengths) are irrelevant.  Thus certain properties of the constituents are relevant, that is, they are necessary to permit the occupancy of a given position, while other properties are irrelevant.  The more highly the whole is organized, the more the inherent properties of parts are utilized as co-determinants of positional value.  The human organism, for example, is highly economical in this respect.  It carries a minimal load of irrelevant properties of parts; most of its properties are "utilized," that is, they codetermine the positional value of the part.

 

4. Any relationship between items and any arrangement of items presupposes their separation.  Multiplicity of objects is possible only in some kind of dimensional domain, of which space and time are the clearest examples.  Although the dimensional domain is a necessary condition for both relationships and systems, its function differs in the two cases.  In a relationship, the role of the dimensional domain is merely disjunction of the relata; to be compared, two objects have to be separate, e.g., in space or time.  In systems, the dimensional domain not only serves to separate the parts but also participates in the formation of the system.  The system itself is dimensional.  A system is a distribution of the members in a dimensional domain.

 

The increasing awareness of the problem of wholes on the part of biologists and psychologists has led, in the last decades, to the discovery of certain general principles, which are best formulated by the Gestalt psychologists: Wertheimer, Koehler, Koffka.  It will be useful to examine briefly some of these principles and definitions in the light of the formulations given above.

 

Wholes have been characterizes as unitas multiplex.  Let us consider the second word first.  Since a system is a way of arranging parts, the role of multiplicity is obvious; a single factor cannot be arranged.  The first word of the expression refers to the fact that every system has one and only one construction principle-the system principle of the whole.  For example, the system principle of the cycle is equidistance of all points from the center.  In a given whole, the system principle may be realized either perfectly or only approximately.  There are wholes in which all the significant positions of the system are occupied in perfect accordance with the system principle; and there are wholes in which only a limited number of positions are occupied in this way, while other members are out of position.  The terms "good" and "bad" Gestalt refer to this difference; the degree of Praegnanz a Gestalt may have depends on the extent to which the positions of the parts conform with the system principle of the whole.  In some cases enough positions are occupied to indicate the system principle, while other positions are not filled.  These are the "open" Gestalts, to be distinguishes from "closed" ones, in which all the significant positions are occupied.

 

Dynamic Wholes

 

So far I have discussed systems in general, but at this point a distinction has to be made.  This distinction applies to relations as well as to systems.  Certain relations, as, for instance, comparative ones (a is larger than b), could be called static, whereas others could be called dynamic.  The prototype of dynamic relations is the casual relationship.  In the same way one can distinguish between static and dynamic systems.  In application to the latter, the formulations of the general laws of system must be specified so as to take into account their dynamic functional properties.  Thus, applied to dynamic wholes, the statement that the parts are determined by their position in the system means that a given part would function differently depending on the whole to which it belongs.  We would also expect the whole to have its own characteristic dynamics, different from that of casual connections.  Certain principles of holistic dynamics have been formulated by the Gestalt psychologists, as, for instance, the "tendency to closure" and the "tendency to Praegnanz." These tendencies could be regarded as subvarieties of a more inclusive tendency-the tendency toward a complete realization of the system principle.  This is accomplished in the case of closure by filling in the unoccupied positions; the tendency toward Praegnanz aims at a rearrangement of parts that would move the outlying items into positions required by the system principle.  System dynamics-or at least one basic principle of system dynamics-would then consist in a movement toward a greater approximation of the system principle.

 

The possibility of the dynamic action of a system would probably be rejected a priori by many students.  In the last analysis causality is just as inexplicable as system action and might even be an extremely simplified form of system action; yet a formulation of the dynamics of a given happening in terms of causality is generally felt to have greater scientific validity than its formulation in terms of system action.  Casual thinking has been used in science for such a long time, and in certain fields with such success, that it is almost generally considered to be the scientific thinking, although it may well be only a subvariety.  It is, in any case, a firmly rooted habit, not easily changed to a basically different approach.  Dealing with relations and dealing with systems involves quite different psychological processes.  In casual thinking and research the task is to single out, from a multitude of data, pairs of facts between which there is a necessary connection.  In system thinking the task is not to find direct relations between items but to find the superordinate system in which they are connected or to define their positional value within such a system.  It might well be that the distinction Jaspers makes between two processes of knowing, Erklaeren and Verstehen (explanation and understanding), refers precisely to the difference between relational thinking and system thinking.^[1] 

 

Personality as an Organized Whole

 

The preceding analysis of the structure and functioning of wholes has definite bearings on the problem of personality integration.  To establish a framework within which some of these implications can be developed, we must first see how the main concepts used in our general analysis apply to personality.  This involves stating the nature of the material that is organized in the personality structure, the nature of the dimensional domain within which the part processes are arranged, and the system principle which defines this holistic organization.

 

To start with the last, according to our theory the system principle of the total process of living is the double dynamic pattern formed by the two major human trends: the trend toward increased autonomy and the trend toward homonomy.  These trends divide and subdivide, branching out from the very general into more and more specific attitudes towards specific objects and values and ultimately result in concrete needs and drives.  These drives seek expression in actual behavior which always involves an interaction of personal trends with the opportunities and contraventions presented by the environment.  Thus, although the subject, the pattern of organismic trends, is the organizing factor of the life process, the material that is being organized also includes various aspects of the environment.  The position within the personality system of any factor, subjective or environmental, is characterized by its function; it is determined by whether the given factor promotes or handicaps the realization of the basic dynamic pattern and by the specific ways in which it does so.

 

The domain in which life processes are distributed and arranged has at least three dimensions.  The first is the vertical dimension leading from depth to surface, from potentiality to actuality.  The depth of the personality is formed by the basic human trends in their increasingly individualized elaboration, and the surface is formed by the manifest behavior which alone is accessible to direct observation.  The arrangement within the vertical structure is such that a factor closer to the surface is a concretization, a partial manifestation of the nearest deeper-lying factor; in this dimension the relationship between part and whole is the relationship between the expression and the expressed.

 

When a general trend reaches the surface in the form of a specific drive, need, or wish, it usually leads to some action aiming at the satisfaction of this drive.  As a rule the goal cannot be achieved at once but only through a series of successive phases.  The dimension along which these successive phases are arranged could be called the dimension of progression.  Organization along this dimension is a teleological or a means-end organization, each phase being the end for the preceding and the means for the following phase.  In studying such sequences one has a certain choice as to the size of the parts, or phases, one wishes to consider, but the division cannot be purely arbitrary.  It must follow the internal articulation of the process, which in turn is determined by the nature of the goal one has chosen for study.

 

The "vertical" and the "progressive" dimensions do not exhaust the ways in which part processes may coexist within personality.  If they are not differentiated from each other as means and ends, or as surface and depth, the part processes may be assumed to exist side by side, in a transverse dimension, the dimension of breadth.  This would hold for those expressions of a basic trend which have the same position on the vertical dimension, none lying deeper than the rest.  Similarly, in a complex movement involving several muscles, their simultaneous contractions to not stand in a means-end relationship to each other but exist side by side, i.e., in a transversal arrangement.  The organization along this dimension is one of coordination or synergy.  Each item of behavior can be described in terms of its position on these three scales, although they do not exhaust all imaginable principia individuationis, i.e., all the significant ways in which part processes in personality can be differentiated from one another.

 

Personality may be viewed as a highly organized whole, a hierarchy of systems.  The significant positions in its overall organization are occupied by parts which themselves are systems; the constituents of these secondary system may also be systems and so on.  Since in systems the dimensional domain in which the parts are distributed participants in their patterning, the dimensions enumerated also provide the general bases for the formation of these hierarchies of systems.  A hierarchy may be organized along the "vertical" dimension.  Thus some personal "axiom of behavior," an implicit assumption of wide bearing which consistently affects action, may be viewed as a subsystem of the person's implicit "philosophy of life" and may itself have subsystems corresponding, e.g., to various areas or methods through which this axiom is implemented.  A long-range personal goal may organize a multitude of activities into a hierarchy of subordinate goals or into a coordination of multiple efforts, i.e., along the "progressive" or the "transverse” dimensions.

 

About the actual content of the various subsystems of personality little can be said that would be of general validity.  Within the realm of physiological functions, certain systems-the alimentary, the respiratory, etc.,- are clearly distinguishable, but this uniformity does not hold for the personal functions whose organization is influenced by the individual's characteristics and fate.  In mapping out the significant areas of personality functioning one can start with those organized by the cultural and social situations, e.g., the person's attitudes and actions in his family, at work, in his profession, etc.  One will soon find, however, that the personal structuring of experiences cuts across the culturally defined roles and follows different paths in different people.  An essential gap in our research skills is the lack of well formulated and tested methods by which we could ascertain, in an individual case, which processed belong to one and the same system or subsystem.

 

An important characteristic of systems or wholes is the degree of their differentiation into parts; this concept has been best formulated theoretically by W. Stern.¹  A part may stand out or it may be embedded in the whole.  When a person crosses a brook by stepping on the stones that are above the water surface, every step has to be individually planned and stands out as a separate act.  In ordinary walking the single steps have little individuality and are more embedded in the total activity.  In a diffuse homogeneous system, the total function is more or less evenly distributed over the entire whole.  When, however, more complex functions are required from a given system, a kind of division of labor takes place and more specific functions are assigned to different parts.  Transient changes of differentiation take place continuously both in the subjective and in the object-related aspect of the organism"s functioning.  In every state or situation one can distinguish a more differentiated component which, at a given moment, stands in the foreground ("figure") and the rather diffuse remainder which forms the background.  What forms the figure can change from moment to moment, but there are also more lasting changes.  Many maturational sequences and many types of learning can be best viewed as processes of successive differentiation.  Even experimental conditioning, traditionally viewed as a concatenation of isolated reflexes, is probably more adequately described as a formation of a new figure-background differentiation.  Successive differentiation is one way in which subsystems of personality are formed.

 

System Action in Personality

 

In studying the hierarchy of systems from the dynamic point of view, it is useful to distinguish the dynamics within a given subsystem and between systems of different orders.  How do changes within a system take place?  A change in the "irrelevant" properties of a part will not change its positional value and consequently will have no effects on the system; for example, walking from one place to another may remain the same system even if the internal structure of the single steps varies considerably.  On the other hand, any change in a part that involves a change of its positional value will affect the structure of the whole.  Such change calls for some kind of rearrangement, and this is effected by certain positional value changes of one or more parts of the whole.  Thus changes within the system do not spread directly from one part to another, but always follow the course from a part to the whole or from the whole to a part.  The stimulus-response connection, from my point of view, is not a part-to-part relationship but an instance of system action, proceeding from the part to the whole and from the whole to the part. Only that factor can become a stimulus which, through its biological relevance, causes a change of constellation in a system-by creating either an "open Gestalt" of a need or a wish, or a "bad Gestalt" of a disturbance of functioning, or an opportunity to express in a particular way the trend that governs the system.  The "response" in every case is a rearrangement aiming at a more complete realization of the system principle.  Those perceptual data that are indicative of neither environmental opportunities nor contraventions do not become active stimuli.  The greater part of these data are simply registered and kept "in reserve” as being of potential significance to the organism.

 

In considering the patterns of interaction between different systems, one must take into account the difference in degree of plasticity that the systems may have.  Plastic systems are those in which parts have variable functions, the variation depending on the constellation of the whole.  In rigid systems, parts have fairly fixed positions, i.e., they carry out highly standardized, uniform functions.  The sensory-neuromuscular functions which have a broad range of variation, corresponding to the high variability of conditions in the external environment, are an example of a plastic system; no fixed functions would be adequate to manage such a range of changes.  The visceral functions, on the other hand, form a more rigid system which deals adequately with a more standardized, highly homeostatic environment.  Because of the "fixation," of a low variability of functions, processes in plastic systems spread upward and downward, to superordinated and subordinated systems.

 

Before we consider the manner in which a change in a given system spreads to other systems, we must clarify the concept of part from a new angle.  Unlike fragments, which are results of arbitrary divisions, parts are articulated out of a whole by its own inherent organization.  The parts of the process of walking are steps, whereas, e.g., the last fourth of the first step, together with the first half of the second step, is a unit resulting from an arbitrary fragmentation of the total process.  The implicit criterion we use in singling out natural parts is the extent of their contribution to the whole.  The function of walking is the change of place.  The body is not yet displaced when the leg is only lifted; progression is made only when the foot reaches the ground again, i.e., when the step is completed.  Thus the part must be relatively complete in itself and contribute directly to the function of the whole.

 

This implies that the concept of parts should be reserved for immediate parts.  The restriction is necessary if the concept is to have any meaning or value.  It would not mean much, e.g., to state that the word "man" is part of a textbook of sociology in which it occurs, or that the sound "o" is a part of a paragraph dealing with social issues.  A sound cannot be part of a sentence without being a part of a word, and the word cannot be part of a treatise unless it is a part of a sentence; meaningful analyses of part-whole relationships can be made only in terms of immediate parts.  In other words, part and whole refer to connections between neighboring regions or systems.

 

This situation has important implications for the dynamics of wholes.  Since system action consists of a change progressing from part to whole, or vice versa, and since the part-whole relation is always that of neighboring regions, it follows that the spread of change from any section of the whole is continuous.  In application to the hierarchy of systems this means that a change in one system cannot directly affect a distant region in the hierarchy.  To affect such a region the change must spread downward or upward across the intermediary systems.  For this reason, attempts to establish direct relationships between processes belonging to distance sectors of the organism's functioning are of limited value, even if they result in sizeable correlations.  Most of the studies of personality functioning which follow this model without attempting to trace the chain of system action connecting these distant segments prove very unenlightening.  The continuous spread of change in a composite system may be regarded as one of the basic laws of system dynamics.

 

Multiple Utilization of Parts

 

What has been said so far might seem to imply that the subsystems of personality are at all times clearly separated from one another, the parts being permanent "possessions" of a given system and of no other.  Such a conception would be misleading.  We must correct it by describing a situation which is of paramount importance for the understanding of disturbances of integration.

 

If a given function has been identified as part of the given subsystem, this connection is usually not permanent.  In a plastic system an individual function a may at one time be a part of the subsystem A, at another time a part of the subsystem B or C.  New functions can arise not only through differentiation from the old ones but also through a rearrangement of the same part functions to form different total functions.  Thus an individual muscle contraction may on different occasions be a part of widely different motor patterns.

The organism works in a very economical way, carrying out a great many functions with the aid of a relatively small number of individual items.  This is possible only if several functions are assigned simultaneously or successively to a given part.  Such a situation might be described as functional overcrowding; occasionally it manifests itself also as morphological overcrowding.  A good example is the anatomical combination of the urinary and sexual organs; the urethra in the male, for instance, is just as much a part of the urinary as of the genital system. Another example is the close association of the nutritive, speech, respiratory, and some additional minor functions which are carried out by means of the morphological structures of the "oral zone."  The functional overcrowding of the organism is greatly increased by the fact that secondary meanings may be superimposed on primary biological functions.  Multiple functioning applies also to environmental conditions.  A given environmental factor may present opportunities for the formation of several systems.  Multiple motivation of a single act is not an exception but the rule in personality dynamics.

 

Since the part functions of the organism serve various purposes, an orderly way of functioning is possible only by means of precisely working mechanisms which prevent interference between systems having equal claim to the same group of part functions.  These mechanisms are the setting and the shifting of set, comparable to setting the typewriter to write small or capital letters.  Setting can be defined as the construction of a system.  The parts have multiple functional possibilities, but after being arranged in a given system, they function in one definite way, namely, in accordance with the system principle.  The other functional possibilities of the parts are excluded; they become activated only when the parts are rearranged in other systems and work in accordance with the new system principle, i.e., after a shift of set.  Setting and shifting may thus be regarded as the key mechanisms of organized activity.

 

Competition of Systems

 

The multiple utilization of part functions is a most economical arrangement, but it represents at the same time a serious vulnerability of the organism.  In spite of the high efficiency of the setting and shifting mechanisms, the mutual interference of systems is inevitable in an organization as complex as the biological total process.  Competition between two or more systems is the basis of certain pathological conditions as well as of many everyday phenomena.  By competition of two systems is meant a configuration of two tendencies aiming to utilize the same part functions in two different systems.  Frequently the configuration is such that one of the system-forming tendencies has a greater potency and becomes the leading system, A; the system of smaller potency may be called the interfering system, B.  If A and B have one part function, a, in common, a comes under the influence of two forces, each tending to make it function according to a different system principle.  This may have various effects, depending on the balance of the two forces.

 

An interfering system which lacks the strength to displace the leading system may become manifest merely by inhibiting the leading function.  The leading function in this case has to assert itself against the pressure of the interfering system.  The ensuing phenomena, which may be called symptoms of pressure, often take the form of fatigue and tenseness.  Fatigue is characterized by the slowing down of the leading activity or by an increasing difficulty in carrying it out.  This may happen not only because there is insufficient energy available for the function, but also because the function has to proceed against the pressure of interfering systems.  So-called "mental fatigue" seems to be prevalently of the second type.  Sometimes the balance of forces between the two systems may oscillate.  The interfering system may come close to breaking through, be repelled, then again come close to breaking through and so forth.  We may say metaphorically that in such instances the interfering system does not exert a uniform pressure on the leading function but pounds at it.  Such a constellation of forces manifests itself in the syndrome commonly called "nervousness," i.e., restlessness, irritability, and jerkiness of behavior.  The pathological condition that used to be called neurasthenia is characterized mainly by pressure symptoms: fatigue, difficulty in concentrating, and tenseness.  Similarly the so-called "experimental neurosis," which can be produced in animals by the artificial setting of conflicting functional systems, manifests itself in restlessness or in fatigue-like phenomena occasionally leading to sleep.

 

Symptoms of pressure appear when the balance of forces between the competing systems is markedly in favor of the leading systems.  When the interfering system is somewhat stronger but still not strong enough to displace the leading system, it may intrude into it at various points.  The phenomena which thus arise may be called symptoms of intrusion.  The seemingly unmotivated appearance of compulsive and obsessive phenomena, which intrude on the course of the leading activities, are good examples of this group of symptoms.  The interfering system may modify or twist the leading activity.  Good examples of such twisting are the Fehlhandlungen-slips and other "paraphenomena" which have been extensively studied by psychoanalysts.  The expressions of the interfering system not only twist the functioning of the dominant one but get twisted themselves in the process.  One of the common ways in which an inhibited tendency can seek and find expression is by reaching closure through a short cut, that is, leaving out essential intermediary steps, thus forming a closed but incomplete Gestalt.  When inhibited tendencies find an outlet in fantasy (skipping action), this may be considered an example of a short cut.

 

An even more severe form of system interference than that of intrusion is present when neither of the conflicting systems predominates over the others.  This may give a rise to such phenomena as retardation, indecision, ambivalence.  In severe cases it leads to a mutual invasion of the competing systems.  This invasion manifests itself in a chaotic constellation in which on function is leading, and fragments of systems are intermingled in a disorderly way, none of the incipient activities reaching completion.  Such a picture can be observed in the various kinds of confusional states, e.g., in the mutual invasion of thought systems resulting in fragmentation of thinking.  Systems of psychomotor activity may also mutually invade each other and result in a chaotic confusional picture.  This situation can be observed in a mild form even in states of embarrassment; it is quite marked in the "catastrophic reactions" described by Goldstein.¹  Extreme disintegration of activity is occasionally found in schizophrenic patients.  Mutual invasion of systems may take various forms, depending on the systems involved.  I have described certain forms of spatial disorientation, for instance, as states of confusion resulting from the mutual invasion of contradictory orientation schemata.  The mutual invasion may be a relatively local affair, or it may involve the whole personality.

 

The interfering system may gain in potency with the passage of time and push the leading into the background.  Then the roles are changed; the interfering system becomes the leading one and vice versa.

 

The successive appearance of the various types of symptoms arising from competition of systems can be observed in many cases of schizophrenia during the onset of the illness.  The early signs may be only symptoms of pressure: fatigue, inability to work, difficulty in concentrating.  Restlessness may follow.  The threat of intruding tendencies is frequently anticipated by the patient who has a sense of undefined impending danger.  Isolated intrusions of interfering tendencies may then appear, frequently followed by a period of confusion, panic, or other form of mutual invasion of systems until finally the interfering tendencies break through and assume the lead in the guise of frankly psychotic behavior.

 

Interference of systems is a very common phenomenon and is not pathological in itself.  Inhibited functions may be ventilated during sleep, find an outlet in fantasy, or be disposed of in some other way; sometimes they fade away or weaken with time.  System interference becomes pathological only when the interfering system is persistent and when the personality strongly resists its expression; this constellation represents a serious menace to the existing personality organization.

 

Segregation of Systems

 

Competition of system is not the only source of disturbances of integration.  They can also arise from a lack of coherence and of regular communication between systems, resulting in segregation of systems.  Capacity for extensive differentiation is the normal feature of personality organization which facilitates the disjunction or segregation between systems.  The greater the differentiation of a system, the more the parts are individualized and independent of the part functions, that is, a danger of disintegration.  A whole may differentiate into so many specialized parts that their unification and control may present a serious problem.  Although normally, through a process of synthesis, the differentiated parts are again closely integrated into the whole, under certain conditions which interfere with this process the organism may fail in this task.

 

The segregation of systems shows various pictures according to the systems involved.  When there is a break in the continuity of the "vertical" dimension, depth and surface become disjointed.  Since the surface is the specific expression and concretization of the depth, incongruity between the expression and that which is expressed may result.  Personal tendencies remain unexpressed; surface manifestations, no longer expressing deeper tendencies, become superficial and shallow.  When the break is in the dimension of progression, that is, when the means-end organization is disrupted, the activity may be aborted before it can reach completion and "closure" is prevented.  A real segregation of systems occurs when subordinate goals become independent and lose contact with the main goal of activity, which may result in a fragmentation and disintegration of the total function.  Segregation in the transverse structure may be called dissociation.  This type of segregation consists in a lack of coordination between the parts of a whole and manifests itself in a kind of dysplastic behavior, in a lack of coordination between the various tendencies and attitudes of the person.

 

Segregation in one dimension is usually followed by segregation in other dimensions.  In cases of good integration the connections of a given act or a given experience extend over a wide range of systems, but in the case of segregation the occurrence becomes a more or less localized affair.  We refer to this difference in daily life when we say that one person is doing something "half heartedly" and that another is involved "body and soul."  Activities severed from other parts of the personality are less forceful and energetic than those that are well integrated with the rest of the personality and consequently are supported and reinforced by many subsystems.  The amount of energy which propels activity depends to a great extent upon the integrational status of the person.

 

Bionegativity and Its Origins

 

The discussion of the disturbances of integration has led us into the field of pathological behavior.  However, since we are discussing not only severe but also mild and transitory conditions, we shall substitute the term bionegative for the term pathological.  Bionegative behavior can best be defined in terms of integration.  In an ideally healthy organism the various part processes are integrated in such a way that they subserve and promote the total function of the organism-its twofold dynamic pattern.  Abnormality, or bionegativity, may be defined as a personality constellation in which one or more part processes disturb the total function of the organism.

 

The definition has various implications.  Bionegativity is an integrational status, a specific relation between part and whole.  Neither the personality as such nor any of its part processes in themselves can be called bionegative or abnormal; these terms refer to their relationship.  Even in the most sweeping personality disorders, the total personality tends to behave according to its inherent tendencies, although their expressions are distorted in consequence of severe bionegative constellations.  A given factor may be bionegative in one personality organization and biopositive in another.  (Some conditions, however, would be bionegative in any personality organization, e.g., a damage or lack of some part function which is essential for the total function, as is often the case in brain injuries.)  A condition that is statistically abnormal may in some instances be an indication of bionegativity; such a condition also tends to become bionegative because of society's intolerance of too much deviation from the average.  However, the correlation between the bionegative and the statistically deviating is not high enough to make a distinction superfluous.

 

For a thorough understanding of various bionegative conditions it is essential to keep in mind that a disturbance of integration rarely remains localized and isolated; very often it induces further disturbances, and the picture becomes increasingly involved.  In attempting to follow such a complex picture in all of its articulations, one must be aware that the various observed symptoms may represent different orders of phenomena, in terms of their nature and origins.

 

The original source of disturbance may be a trauma, i.e., the interference of some outside agent with the functions of the organism.  The traumatic origin-one traceable to a gross physical or chemical agent, or to pathogenic micro-organisms-can be demonstrated for organic diseases of known etiology.  For the congenital diseases , traumatic origin can be reasonably assumed to be some kind of damage to the germ cell.  In personality disorders, although the endogenous origin of some cannot be excluded, a traumatic origin is very likely; a healthy organism would hardly begin to malfunction without the interference of some noxious agent.  The organism is continuously exposed to traumata.  Life itself, by its very nature, can be considered a traumatic process.  While the organism is governed by its inherent dynamic tendencies, the environment follows its own laws without regard for the needs of the organism.  Therefore contact with the environment always involves some traumatic aspects, either in the form of active interferences with the functions of the organism or of inadequacies of the environment with regard to the organism's needs-the traumata of scarcity.

 

Some symptoms can be viewed as direct effects of the traumatic agent.  When a sharp object is thrust into the body the resulting discontinuity of tissues and the flow of blood are determined only by the properties of the object and by the physical and chemical properties of the organism.  At this stage its organismic qualities are not as yet drawn into activity.  Next, however, the organism reacts to the discontinuity of tissues in its own way, a proliferation of connective tissues and blood vessels starts from the walls of the wound and slowly seals up the gap, forming a scar.  This may be the end of the process, but very often it is not.  The reaction of the organism to the traumatic damage is an unusual condition, and as such it may act as a further trauma.  The scar, after retraction of the connective tissues, may cause a second trauma.  The scar on a tubular organ might cause stenosis, in the brain it might cause mechanical irritation.  Here we deal with a symptom that is a casual derivative of an organismic reaction.  The new damage calls for new adjustive measures on the part of the organism.  If the second reaction does not put the organism in equilibrium, further malfunctioning may ensue followed by further adjustive reactions.  Thus we may have, besides the first trauma, casual derivatives of the first, second, etc., order and, correspondingly, organismic reactions to the original trauma and to the casual derivatives of the various orders.  This is a chain of events in which instances of causation alternate with organismic system action.  In this way a very complex state of disturbed integration may gradually come into being which, in the case of personality disorders, can be analyzed and understood only if one knows enough of the patient's history and has an adequate conceptual framework to guide the analysis.

 

To analyze the disturbance correctly is important also from the practical point of view, in order to choose the correct therapeutic approach.  Some school of psychopathology deal with every symptom entirely in terms of causation, i.e., from the mechanistic point of view; others tend to view most disturbances almost entirely in terms of purposeful organismic reactions.  If a patient hallucinates, the mechanist would want to know what caused the hallucination and would explain it, for example, by the toxic irritation of a certain cortical area.  A purposivist would concentrate on the question of how the symptom serves the patient, of what he is driving at by hallucinating.  The inadequacy of a strictly mechanistic point of view is obvious, but the exaggeration of the purposivistic approach must also be warned against.  The planfulness of the organism does not exclude mechanistic happenings, whether they are effects of trauma or casual derivatives of a purposeful action, and the phenomenology of the symptom does not always reveal its origin.

 

Let me use a fanciful analogy.  According to a popular belief, the rabbit, before he leaves his warren in wintertime, makes a number of long jumps around the warren, covering a large area with irregularly distributed footprints "in order to make it difficult for his enemies to find his trail." Should this be the case it would be an example of a purposeful organismic action.  But when the rabbit, in seeking food or in escaping an enemy, runs through a snow-covered field, it makes no sense to ask what he means by putting his footprints in the snow; the making of footprints is merely a casual derivative of a purposeful action.

 

In personality disturbances, a symptom of traumatic origin may be subsequently utilized for personal purposes; this does not justify the assumption that the symptom itself expresses the organism's purpose or that the suffering it entails results from the patient's masochism.  In bionegative constellations both casual effects and organismic reactions are responsible for symptom