Méthode de recherche hypothétique et processuelle

Abstract

The current multiplicity of research methods in the field of clinical psychoanalysis runs the risk of advocating the superposition of models by abolishing antagonisms to better accentuate complementarities, sometimes giving the illusion of a methodological profusion expanding the field of possibilities. GoalThis article proposes to return to the epistemological foundations of these models, which invariably questions the adequacy of the selected scientific criteria. It aims to get rid of a syncretic drawdown that would otherwise contribute to the impoverishment of this structuring heterogeneity. The methodological principles derived from the experimental model are now becoming established in the field of human and social sciences. Far from challenging this model, this article nevertheless aims to question this hegemonic risk, or at least an increasing and imperative homogenization linked to the standardization of scientific publication, by examining the passageways that would allow a fruitful dialogue at the borders of psychoanalysis. MethodThe article questions the epistemological foundations, first, of two methodologies regularly encountered in the clinical field — the single case method and the hypothetical-deductive method — and then, of models historically derived from anthropology and sociology — grounded theory model and extended translation model. The latter share with our approach the concern for the defense and enhancement of qualitative research. ResultsThe tension between these different models is used to identify the contributions and limits likely to shed light on the specific epistemological issues, the choices of methodological operationalization, and the choices of exposure of clinical research results related to psychoanalysis. The article encourages psychoanalysts to find opportunities to structure their work around the maintenance of a homomorphism between psychoanalytic and research processes. These considerations lead us to focus attention on the conditions required to inscribe processuality and the maintenance of a theoretical-clinical gap at the heart of the clinical research method. In this way, the paper lays the foundations for a modeling of a hypothetical and process-oriented research method. This method is based on taking the complex and necessarily asymptotic apprehension of the unconscious into account. From this perspective, the writing phase has a dual function: on the one hand, it doubles the effects of processuality and of the “après-coup” of research; on the other hand, the choice of methodological exposure of the results must propose common conditions for debate within a controversial field. ConclusionThis article proposes a first step in the formalization of a “hypothetical and processual research method.” This method is likely to offer a narrative that integrates both the constraints related to the dynamics of the singular production of knowledge in psychoanalysis's clinical field and the constraints promoting a broader scientific debate.