Objects of desire and the mediated self: addictions, compulsions and fetishism in the technoculture arena

Abstract

This paper explores the idea that electronic computer-based media, also referred to as the new technologies, may act as receptacles for and transmitters of projected aspects of the self. These aspects of the self then enter into relations with a new and emerging range of technologically generated objects, which may critically influence aspects of the therapeutic relationship. In the virtual worlds that evolve in relation to the new technologies, obsessional thinking and compulsive behaviours may be stimulated, precisely because split off aspects of the self must be constantly monitored as stored images, interacting with signifiers in the technological chain, often felt to be under threat from a range of potentially persecutory and bizarre objects [Bion, 1962. A theory of thinking. International Journal of Psychoanalysis. 43]. It is suggested that an intra-psychic representation of the self, the mediated self, may evolve based on a blurring of the lines of demarcation between projected/introjected elements of the self and its objects. Drawing upon clinical case material, where appropriate, the author also discusses some similarities and differences between various forms of substance addiction, computer compulsions and, more broadly, the idea of the fetishistic object relation.