[Disorders of the diagnostic judgment process in pre-oedipal pathologies]

The processual and argumentative treatment of diagnostic data that characterizes the development of a psychoanalytic judgment appears to be subject to frequent disturbance in cases of pre-oedipal pathologies. Partly as a result of the strong resistance and refusal patterns of such patients, the psychoanalyst neglects to subject to critical analysis his own expectations of progression and his own standards of judgment. In addition, he often makes an effort to protect himself from the sado-masochistic offers of interaction of these patients. If the transference relationship represents the field on which the spectrum of the neurotic patient's relationships is to be redefined, the point of psychoanalytic treatment in cases of pre-oedipal pathologies is to provide the patient with a "playground" on which the rift between the infantile experience of insatiable drives and needs on the one hand and the world of social action perceived as empty, lifeless, and alien on the other can be played out and overcome.