1. (paper for the 5th International Conference on The Theory
of Positive Disintegration, USA, Florida, August 2002)
Author: Tadeusz Kobierzycki Ph.D. – Music Academy of
Frederic Chopin in Warsaw
2. Introduction
Kazimierz Dabrowski (1902-1980), a distinguished Polish psychiatrist,
psychotherapist and philosopher, author of an existential conception of personality,
creativity and mental health. Soon he became responsible for a major breakthrough
in the diagnosis of certain phenomena of mental disorder such as nervousness,
neurosis, psychoneurosis and psychosis. When creating his own psychology and
psychopathology of creativity, Dabrowski refers to ideas and works of Edouard de
Claparede, Jean Piaget, Carl G. Jung (Switzerland), Sigmund Freud, Wilhelm
Stekel (Austria), Ernst Kretschmer (Germany) and Cesare Lombrozo (Italy),
creating his own conception of personal development.
The author’s first attempt to analyze creative personalities can be found in
his doctoral thesis titled “Psychological Bases of Self-Mutilation”, published in
Warsaw in 1934 (and Boston, in USA 1937). The first analyses examine the
personalities of Michael Angelo, Blaise Pascal, Fyodor Dostoyewski, Otto
Weininger, Miguel de Unamuno, Franz Kafka, Marcel Proust etc.
Kazimierz Dabrowski carried out his research on the relationship between
mental disorder and creative processes at the State Institute of Mental Hygiene
(1935-1949) as well as at the Institution of Mental Hygiene and Child Psychiatry of
the Polish Academy of Sciences (1958-1965). The results of his investigation were
published and announced in various forms. The most significant of all were the
report of his studies in 1963 and the articles published in 1965, 1979 and 1983 (the
last one after his death in 1980). Here are the most important theories and findings
regarding the link between exceptional abilities and different types of mental health.
3. Key terms and their definitions
For a better introduction, it is essential to convey the author’s
understanding of the examined reality through the terms he used. The key
ones are: exceptional abilities, nervousness, neurosis, psychoneurosis and
mental health – all of which are in a synthesis inside the structure of a
developed personality.
4. 1.
Exceptional abilities – are “qualities or skills that enable one to
achieve, in different areas of human life, results that exceed the average
standard for the person’s age group, education etc.” (K. Dabrowski 1965, 2
p. 54).
During the introductory tests, it was found that people with specific abilities
(i.e. who had the gift for acting, the art of dance, painting and music) would
reach an IQ of 110 to 155 points, whereas those with abilities of a general
nature (i.e. in humanities, mathematics, natural sciences) obtained from 120
to 146 points. The tests were carried out on children and young people
between the age 8 and 23.
5. 2.
Mental health – is “the development towards higher levels of
mental functions, towards the discovery and realization of higher cognitive,
moral, social, aesthetic and religious values and their organization into
hierarchy in accordance with one’s own authentic personality ideal.” (K.
Dabrowski 1972, p. 298).
6. 3.
Nervousness, neurosis, psychoneurosis - the important sign of
participated development of personality is nervousness, i.e. psychic
overexcitability in the five forms: sensual, psychomotor, imaginative,
emotional and intellectual. Nervousness leads to the loosening and
disintegration of original forms of mental organization, creating and
integrating specific forms of neurosis and psychoneurosis on a higher level
than the one that is disintegrating. Somatic disorders are typical of the first,
while the forms of the latter manifest themselves through mental disorders
in the psychoneurotic structure without producing physical signs.
Disintegration through these forms does not produce such signs. Both
forms can disintegrate and integrate the psyche.
It would be inappropriate to define them according to the common belief as
exclusively negative manifestations of mental health and not see them as
positive symptoms.
7. The range of the tests (Warsaw, 1962 year)
In the autumn of the year 1962, K. Dabrowski supervised tests
carried out by a team of doctors and psychologists. Amongst them were
students from art colleges who had been described by their teachers as
exceptionally talented and chosen equally, high school students. The first
group consisted of 50 individuals, the second – 30.
The remaining group consisted of people with intellectual
deficiency (oligophrenics). Among all these people, there were 10 who had
been “spotted” during the preparations for tests on individuals with abilities
and 20 who had been included in the tests on the ground of earlier
diagnosis from Dabrowski’s hospital file.
All the children were examined by a general practitioner, a
neurologist and a psychiatrist. The tests involved an interview on the
individual’s background and information regarding his/her pre-natal life and
family social situation. The report of these tests was published in its
shortened version in 1963 in the “Bulletin of The Polish Society of Mental
Hygiene” in Warsaw.
8. Psychodiagnostic terminology
Due to the restraints imposed by the article, I will concentrate mainly on the
diagnostic terminology regarding those individuals who were found
exceptionally gifted, and I will not include the information on oligophrenics.
Traditional terms of mental conditions used to describe the psychological
phenomena acquired new meaning. Each condition was recognized to have
3 stages:
1.In stage 1, there was a marked illness that distorted the psyche and the
personality, strong tendencies towards aggression or suicide, distinct
psychosomatic disorders and a profound distemper of the “function of
reality” (by French psychiatrist, Pierre Janet).
2.In stage 2, the level of mental disorders observed was average, of cyclic
and repetitive nature.
3.In stage 3, the registered and increased mental activity and phenomena
such as temporary physical agitation, mood-swings, impulsive behavior, a
slight tendency to act and mild reactions of anxiety.
9. Dynamics of inner-psychic reactions
In order to differentiate processes from mental structures, professor K.
Dabrowski introduced the term of the “inner psychic milieu”. It comprises abilities,
talents, interests determined by the individual’s heritage (factor I), the outside, social
world (factor II), and the individual’s own activity (factor III). These create mental,
emotional and imaginative dynamics. On these founds the following were activated:
self-discovery, self-education and self-directing as processes of identification and
the building of one’s own self. They also permit the assimilation, transformation and
unification of the material of the unconscious with the conscious, which enables
profound insight. They stimulate the development of personality and expand the
individual’s perception of the inner-psychic tension.
All those examined were said to have an increased mental activity and be
associated with in inappropriate reactions, which provided bases for the creation of
conditions of neurosis or psychoneurosis. There was no evidence of outside
influence as the cause of these types of reactions, and the living and schooling
conditions were said to be satisfactory. It was discovered however that nearly half of
the people examined did not have an adequately dynamic inner psychic milieu and
did not attempt to exercise self-directing. This was partly due to the age difference,
the psychophysical type, kinds of abilities and nature of the social family situations.
Attention was brought to the kind of inner psychic world, which is the
criterion to differentiate the levels of development and the types of mental disorders
that accompany it.
10. Creative processes of disintegration
The type of abilities, talent, interests and type of emotionality,
mentality and imagination, create, being the main dynamic forces of the inner
psychic milieu, a certain type of personality development. They accelerate it,
leading to a mental crisis of the present arrangement of the outer and innerpsychic integration.
This crisis produces a new constellation, which is diagnosed as neurosis or
psychoneurosis, depending on the prevailing symptoms (somatic or psychic).
This constellation tends to evolve as well as dissolve (Polish neo-evolutionist,
professor of psychiatry at Warsaw University, Jan Mazurkiewicz). In the case
of evolution, a higher level of neurotic or psychoneurotic integration is created.
In the case of dissolution, the reverse occurs. Observations of this kind made
a distinction of two groups of individuals, whose level of evolution and
dissolution was established by indicating the inner psychic world.
Everyone who was examined, irrespectively of his/her type of abilities
at school, in the case of a poor and undeveloped inner psychic milieu
(therefore poor abilities and interests as well as a lack of talent) there was a
prevailing hysterical and neurasthenic disintegration. In the case of a
developed inner psychic milieu, the dominating were anxiety and psychostenic
disintegration. A more detailed picture of the dynamics of disintegration and
integration is shown below.
11. Inner, neurotic or psychoneurotic changes
Type of school
(abilities)
Group I
weak or lack
inner milieu
1. Drama school
Group II
initial or developed
inner milieu
1. psychostenia
2. phobias
3. neurasthenia
4. hypochondria
2. Art school
1. hysteria
2. neurasthenia
3. mania
4. vegetative
psychosis
1. psychostenia
2. phobias
3. neurasthenia
4. mania
3. Ballet school
1. hysteria
2. phobias
3. hypochondria
1. vegetative psychosis
2. phobias
3. neurasthenia
4. High school
1. hysteria
2. phobias
3. hypochondria
1. phobias
2. hypochondria
3. psychostenia
12. For a clearer understanding of the illustrated test, it is essential to ask the
question: Does the tendency towards psychoneurosis produce a necessity to
reconstruct (through disintegration) a system of personality integration? Or is
it that the power of the inner psychic milieu, i.e. a significant mental aptitude
that automatically distorts the higher levels of the function of reality (Pierre
Janet) causing a psychoneurotic reaction or indeed a dissolution or
evolution?
13. Emotional positive disintegration in gifted individuals
The definition of the dynamics of neurosis and psychoneurosis constituted
Dabrowski’s fundamental discovery and was an outcome of tests carried out on gifted
individuals. He called into question the static definitions of neurosis and psychoneurosis,
which reduced their role merely to describe destructive states of mental disintegration.
For he noticed, that both neurosis and psychoneurosis were subject to evolution
and moved onto higher or lower levels. What indicated this type of evolution were the
disorders characteristic of various levels and which Dabrowski described in a multi-level
model of personality.
In this definition, personality is the objective of development (final personality,
developed personality, complete personality etc.), which departs from the personality at
birth and continues through prolonged modifications. They could be described as modal
personality forms or as a modal personality.
One of the aspects of a modal personality is the process of disintegration, which
becomes positive through connection with the other aspect, defined by Dabrowski, as the
inner milieu. The latter is stimulated by disintegration processes, but its function is to
integrate and thus avoid the break-up and destruction of the modal personality, which
could turn into a psychotic one.
Only when the final personality is formed, can the psychoneurotic processes be
weakened and allow for signs of self-knowledge, growth and self-esteem. Until this
happens, the process will be constantly reinforced by neurotic or psychoneurotic sources,
depending on the constellation: heritage, social environment, personal activity.
The analysis of artists’ personalities has shown progressive, and therefore
positive effect of neurosis and psychoneurosis, which in fact improved the state of mental
health. Both were linked to the activity of the inner milieu, which in itself forms the source
of self-therapeutic forces.
14. The phenomenon of creative depression
As to achieve a better illustration of the theory of positive
disintegration, I will attempt to demonstrate my own interpretation of the
relationship between depression and creativity. The source of inspiration have
been my personal talks with K. Dabrowski, which took place in Warsaw, in the
space of many years, his publications and also my own investigations,
hospital practice and experiments in therapy which I performed at the
Student’s School of Mental Hygiene (Warsaw, 1984-1994)1, established and
directed by myself. This interpretation bears strict connection with the theory
of positive disintegration.
Depression, in traditional terms, is a post-ecstatic reaction, which
adopts regressive or self-repressive forms. The metaphor of depression is a
descent, a fall, or degradation (Lat. gradus – grade, degree, level). The main
consequence is the decrease of tension between the conscious and the
unconscious of the individual. The arrangement of tensions in this system
becomes inactive, unproductive and distorted.
_____________________________________________________________
1 In Poland the term student refers to a university or polytechnic level of
education.
15. The person who is entering the sphere of depression perceives the
world as gray, colorless, dull and indifferent. The old “passion of the night” (of
the German existentialist-philosopher Karl Jaspers), that once stirred the
artist, now transforms itself into a dying “night of the soul”(of the Spanish
Christian mystic, Saint John of the Cross). Other defense mechanisms fail to
work efficiently.
For an artist, depression is a cleansing force as it extracts and
separates him from his work. It has to occur periodically, just like it occurs
when parents have to release their child to live his/here own life. Such a
release allows to undertake new creation. Otherwise the artist copies himself,
goes over what he has already done, abuses his work and himself, loosing
slowly his vigor and pleasure from working. If he acted like this, he would
expose himself to worse pain and suffering than he would be if he treated his
depression as a natural factor of development or self-therapy.
Psychoanalysists, (e.g. the Polish-American analytical therapist
Gustaw Bychowski), emphasized the significance of the role of compensation
and sublimation in a creative process. Depression undoubtedly plays such
role and is one of the dynamisms in these processes. This relation can be
reserved. Nevertheless it is a lasting constellation and unless one immerses
in it, no drugs or psychoanalysis or psychotherapy will help. Only a deep, truly
depressive decline will permit the artist to see himself anew, without the
masks, which are his works.
16. Naturally, this journey into oneself, this separation, loneliness and
autism can result in insanity or suicide. But the artist is protected by his rich
psychic “inner milieu”. Nevertheless, once he finds himself in a critical state,
he is capable of damaging and destroying his works, (e.g. the Italian sculptor,
Michael Angelo) that he has done, or injuring himself (e.g. the Dutch painter,
Vincent van Gogh).
Others may feel “sterile” for a long time, “empty”, “dead”. Often they
renounce their creative activity. What is that determines that in one case there
should emerge, after a phase of creative depression, a “creative drive”, a kind
of madness and mania, while in a different case, it can bring an unfortunate
end to the artist.
I believe that depression not only disintegrates and separates but in
can also, after a long explosion or creative ecstasy, execute the role of an
“oppressive body”, through which it is possible to feed the unconscious, empty
of conflicts, with new contents. There is a chance to form a new creative
incentive, one that would suit the artist’s now broader conscious which
managed to appease previous creative urge, ecstasy, exhibitionism”. What
used to be “superior” is now “inferior”.
The “depressiveness” that substituted the conscious and had control
over the unconscious of the artist, now acquire a new scope and cease to play
the role of creative dynamisms. He could well fall into psychosis which is
known for its lack of projection and mixing of the conscious with the
unconscious.
17. Depression therefore immunizes against mental illness, it postpones
it, it is its counter-model. Depression assimilates and assembles the
tendencies do distort perception. Exceptional gifts do not protect from
depression. Their presence transforms depression into a “creative humility”.
Both the euphoric and serene experiences undergo synthesis.
18. Phenomenon of creativeness in oligophrenics
In the case when the personality of gifted people can be
differentiated by their world and the specific sequence of neurosis and
psychoneurosis, what could be said about people with a low IQ? After all they
too engage in creative activities, K. Dabrowski had stated that in the case of
mental deficiency, the development of vegetative neurosis combined with
strong psychophysical and sensual overexcitability, and an overactive sexual
drive are typical. “What sets them apart are also primitive manifestations of phobia,
indifference, euphoria, little susceptibility to suggestions, lack of modesty, excessive
talking etc.”(K. Dabrowski, 1963, 2, 61). From the psychoanalytical point of
view, they should be the most creative. But the reality is different, if we
disregard of course the creativity of the-so-called “naïve”, “inexperienced”,
“savage” artists, whose mythical air attracts attention (e.g. the works of H.
Rousseau /France/, M.A. Moses /USA/, Th. Ociepka /Poland/, N.
Pirosmanai /Georgia/, Ch. Theofilos /Greece/ or of a Polish-Ukranian naïve
painter Nikifor Krynicki.
It seems to me that there is another way of differentiating the
creativity of oligophrenics and the not so talented people besides contrasting
neurosis with the “creative work” and psychic “inner milieu”. It is also possible
using the concept of a “creative instinct”, which can be found in the theory of
positive disintegration, already on the second developmental level.
19. The marked feature of this instinct is the overactive function of the
parameter of movement and energy, when the activity of Gnostic and
emotional parameter of creative instinct, is low. For oligophrenics the values
revolves inside the sphere of sensory experiences (e.g. the best life can offer
is favorite food, someone who gives you something, the worst fears concern
hitting, physical injury, noise or being called names etc.).
Oligophrenics’ shallow emotionality allows them to talk about tragic
incidents with indifference. In this situation, creativity serves to project these
feeling, whose nature is often sexualized, erotic, fairy-tale like and even
when the protagonists look demonic, like stereotypes, or are modified
through a grammatical stream of thought. Its function is preventative while it
brings together prelogic contents that are slowly emerging out of the
unconscious and which oligophrenics find fascinating and whose eroticism
attracts many people.
20. Final comments
In this work I tried to outline Dabrowski’s investigative vision and
conclusions which have never been presented before. I have left out numerous
episodes such as the former debate with Neo-Jacksonists (e.g. polish
psychiatrist Jan Mazurkiewicz, Swiss psychiatrist Constantin von Monakov etc.)
and with psychoanalysts.
Nor have I presented the issue of the psychotherapy that Dabrowski
performed with the artists and for the artists as well as for gifted children, youth
and adults. This subject is looked into as research on creativity, in which the
educational aspects are more stressed, and not clinical. Hence I think the
portrayal of the personality of gifted children and youth is too positive, too
reliable on compulsory “American optimism” (maybe „Polish pessimism” is
talking through me)
For many years Dabrowski claimed that children and youth who were
gifted, always showed a greater psychic sensitivity and fainted to intense
manifestations of psychoneurosis. Both classify the “psychic milieu” and
impose the level of personality development and define the type of creativity.
Some American authors, although they appreciate these perceptions,
do not know what to do with them. The idea of connecting the theory of positive
disintegration with A. Maslow’s theory of self-realization, seems interesting to
my and useful but it disguises the dramatic character of creative development.
The American reception of the theory of positive disintegration is according to
me and the Polish perspective too mitigated.
21. I have also left out the primer question of creative thinking,
described by K. Dabrowski in the report from 1963 year. I believe that what I
have presented can be impetus for a debate and new studies concerning the
personality of gifted humans, who link their passion to evolve with the
passion to create.
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