Finally the experiments were made, with the result as above stated. Now the coconscious images which were accompanied by the tremors, etc., were pictures of herself, of the second patient, and of myself. These images coming and going seemed, as in a pantomime, to symbolize her previous thoughts. Sometimes the image of the second patient turned away from the subject, sometimes the three images were present, but the one of the subject stood apart from the others as if an outcast, and in both these latter cases particularly she would shake with tremor, and would “get awfully hot all over,” and break out in perspiration. Then apparently reassuring pictures would come and the tremor would cease.
Besides these coconscious images there was a train of coconscious thought of which she was not personally aware. There was the thought that perhaps, after all, it was a mistake to have taken part in the experiments, as X, the second patient, was not a physician, and her wish to see the subject hypnotized must have been largely curiosity. Of this train of thought the subject was not aware. At the same time concurrently there was in her personal consciousness the “thought that she liked X, that it was very good of her to have come, and awfully kind of you to take your time to conduct the experiments.” There was also a conscious emotion of pleasure and something akin to hope, and nervousness at the situation. By contrast coconsciously there was a greater feeling of nervousness and the emotion of fear of which she was not consciously aware. By a few appropriate suggestions all these phenomena were made to disappear.
It would take us too long and be too much of a digression to go more deeply into these subconscious phenomena. From what has been given, which is corroborated by a large number of observations of the same sort, it seems to me we are justified in concluding that the physical manifestations of emotion (tremor, etc.) in the instance were determined by subconscious processes which were the functioning residua of antecedent thoughts with their emotions.
But more than this these antecedent thoughts were obsessing ideas of self-abasement, i.e., of herself as a person who socially was stamped with a stigma and, therefore, as a sort of outcast. These thoughts had formed one setting to the actual situation in which she found herself. The subconscious complex, therefore, contained a perception plus the meaning of the situation plus emotion; in other words, the whole of the psychosis including the affect was subconscious in that none of its elements emerged into consciousness. Another and rival perception of the situation was that which was actually in consciousness and which has been described. The physical phenomena were the manifestation of the subconscious affect and would have been equally manifested if the affect had become conscious. In such a case, then, we may say the whole of one setting actually functions subconsciously.
The case of H. O. is the same in principle as I interpret it, but is distinguished by the fact that the dissociation of processes was not so extreme. The obsessing idea was in the ultramarginal zone of consciousness and, to this extent, subconscious. Briefly stated, H. O. for many years was the victim of an intense obsession, in consequence of which she had practically foregone social life, and found herself unable to travel for fear she would be afflicted with her psychosis in trains, etc. The physical symptom was intense nausea suddenly arising as an attack. When attacked with this there developed also depression and a mental state which is perhaps best described as a mood. She could give no explanation of the attacks. On examination it developed that always in the “background of her mind,” just preceding the attack, there came the idea of disgust of self. At once the nausea as the physical expression of disgust was experienced. The disgust-idea was always excited by some associated stimulus. The meaning of this “sentiment” was set in a large complex of past experiences. Into all this I will not go. The point is that the only conscious elements of her obsession were in the extreme fringe of consciousness, sufficiently dissociated to be practically coconscious,[[175]] but the physical symptoms were distressingly prominent. Relief was easily effected simply by organizing a new complex giving a new point of view of self.
Complexes consisting entirely of the physiological manifestations of emotion without conscious emotion undoubtedly occur. A long time ago I described such a neurosis under the name of Fear Neurosis[[176]] in distinction from psychosis. The symptom complex was interpreted as a persisting automatism derived from antecedent fear states that had been outgrown. From our present standpoint and fuller knowledge we must believe that underlying this automatism is probably an unconscious complex of these antecedent experiences including the fear which takes part in the functioning mechanism. It may be called, then, a subconscious psychosis.
True hysterical laughter and crying are undoubtedly phenomena of this type and due to the same mechanism. These phenomena are well known to be purely automatic; that is to say, they are emotional manifestations unaccompanied in consciousness by thoughts or even by emotions corresponding to them. The subject laughs or cries without knowing why and without even feeling merry or sad. I forbear to digress sufficiently to present the evidence for the interpretation that the phenomena are due to subconscious processes of the kind just described. Let me merely say that in one instance, N. O., intensely studied, the automatic crying was traced by experimental and clinical methods to a persisting and often insistent subconscious childhood’s perception and meaning of self—as a lonely, unhappy child. This perception, etc., could be differentiated from the conscious perception belonging to adult age.
Numerous observations of emotional phenomena similar in principle have been recorded in the case of Miss B.[[177]] These observations included automatic facial expressions of pleasure, anger, and fear. These expressions could always be traced to subconscious processes and in this case to actual ideas of a coconscious personality. But the principle is the same. Sometimes the affect linked to the process welled up into consciousness and sometimes it did not. When, in the case of Miss B., the automatic phenomena were determined by coconscious ideas it was because the perceptions of the secondary subconscious personality had a humorous, angry, or fear setting, as the case might be. These particular observations are of especial interest because they allow us to clearly distinguish at almost one and the same moment the different manifestations corresponding to the different settings with which the same idea may be clustered. While, for instance, the personal consciousness of Miss B. perceived a person or situation with apprehension and manifested this apprehension in her facial expression as well as verbally, the subconscious perception of the same person or situation was one of joy which broke through Miss B.’s apprehensive feature in automatic smiles. In other words, two different perceptions (with opposite meanings) of one and the same object functioned at the same time.
These observations, as interpreted, are of wider significance in that they allow us to understand the mechanism of many phenomena of everyday life. For instance, the hysteria of crowds may be explained on the same principle; likewise the outbreak of emotional physical manifestations in a person whose attention is absorbed (abstraction and distraction) in reading or hearing something (e. g., at a play), which, it may be inferred, touches some inner emotional experience of his life. In the kind of instance I have in mind introspection fails to reveal the presence of conscious thoughts or sometimes even emotions which adequately explain the physical disturbance. When not abstracted by the reading or play, the same ideas he was attending to a moment before fail to excite these disturbances.
As has been said, “everyone is a little hysterical,” meaning that under certain conditions—particularly those of stress and strain and strong emotion—the mind becomes a bit disintegrated, and unconscious complexes manifest themselves through what are called hysterical symptoms.