Epigenetic Reconstruction in Dreaming

Abstract

Extensions of Freud's work by Jung, Silberer, French, Hall, and Erikson suggest the normal psychological function of dreaming to be the pre-rational processing of developmental tasks. Current research by the author seeks to codify how dreaming performs chis function. An exploratory hypothesis suggests a process of epigenetic reconstruction, defined as the preconscious re-differentiation and re-integration of pre-adaptive developmental achievements under pressure of problematic re-adaptive crises. Evidence of such a process is sought in structural configurations of reported manifest dreams of normal subjects, as interpreted by way of Erikson's schemata: the psychosexual zones and modes, the psychosocial modes and modalities, and the normal growth crises. Indications are encouraging that an epigenetic reconstruction process can be traced which complements the sleep-protective wishfulfillment process. For example, a normal female adolescent reported the following dream: An image of walking down 18th Street toward and Noble's. When I got there I kept looking around at all the people who were passing the bookstore. At first I was puzzled that I did not see anyone that I knew but soon I felt deserted and I began to cry. . . The next thing that I remember was the consciousness of being near a brook; the brook was running past me, and I was standing on a rock nearby. At first I just stood there, but eventually 1 began ro prepare to dive from the rock into the water, but I could not force myself to do so. The dreamer's associations reveal the Barnes and Noble's item to be a disguised expression of oedipal wishes. Simultaneously, structural analysis renders the following epigenetic transcription: The locomotor zone (walking) in association with the passive-incorporative mode (kept looking around at all the people who were passing) activates feelings of ambivalent trust (was puzzled that I did not see anyone I knew) and then feelings of mistrust (felt deserted). . . Then, the inhibited locomotor zone (standing on a rock . . . just stood there), in association with the passive incorporative mode ( the brook was running past me) activates an inhibition of the intrusive mode (1 began to dive but I could not force myself to do so) . Throughout there are ambivalent overtones of the phase specific identity crisis: she first looks for familiar others, and then finds puzzlement and desertion in aloneness. A process of ego synthesis may be inferred, which is consistent with theoretical expectations of normal female identity formation.