A note on Mark Solms’s paper

Journal title PSICOTERAPIA E SCIENZE UMANE
Author/s Otto F. Kernberg
Publishing Year 2022 Issue 2022/3
Language Italian Pages 2 P. 429-430 File size 21 KB
DOI 10.3280/PU2022-003003
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In the paper "Revision of drive theory" (Psicoterapia e Scienze Umane, 2022, 56, 3: 363-422) Mark Solms (2021a) correctly argues that the basic motivational forces are affect systems, acti-vated following the general homeostatic principles that govern biological processes that assure survival and reproduction. However, psychoanalytic object relation theory points to a specifically human, supraordinate integrative motivational system that condenses component affect systems into the affiliative and counteraffiliative motivations described by Freud with the concepts of libi-do and aggression. They are not "drives" in the psychobiological sense, but profoundly define unconscious intrapsychic conflict and are relevant in clinical psychoanalysis.

Keywords: Drives; Affects; Neuropsychoanalysis; Psychoanalytic object relation theory; Libido and aggression

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Otto F. Kernberg, Una nota sull’articolo di Mark Solms. in "PSICOTERAPIA E SCIENZE UMANE" 3/2022, pp 429-430, DOI: 10.3280/PU2022-003003