Synopsis
In what ways can psychology bridge the gap between normal and abnormal mental life? Professor Peter McKellar believes that the words ‘experience’ and ‘behaviour’ provide on answer: what men and women do, their behaviour, becomes more understandable when we know more about their experience. This book provides a guide to understanding psychological phenomena which are, or seem to be, abnormal. It also examines the relation of these to subjective experiences of people we regard as normal, this emphasizing the continuity between normal and abnormal mental life.
Reflecting the recent revival in interest in dissociation of the personality, rather than thinking of a single ‘Unconscious’, Professor McKellar examines the rich variety of subjective experiences: hypnagogic imagery, imaginary companions, déjà vu, synaesthesia, illusions of waking while still asleep, and lucid dreams when there is a co-conscious awareness of being asleep and dreaming. He discusses seemingly supernatural interpretations and ‘spirit possessions’ beliefs about multiple personality and dissociation.
Professor McKellar brings to his analysis the perspectives of anthropology and the history of ideas, especially within science and philosophy. He argues that ‘the psychologist character in literature’ has frequently shown the way to the scientific psychologist: writers like Dostoevsky, Cervantes, Melville, Poe and Coleridge have drawn on introspection as well as observation in creating their characters and insights.
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Synopsis
Neuroses, pyschoses, hypnagogic imagery, lucid dreams, deja vu, imaginary companions - these are just some of the experiences discussed in this fascinating and readable study of the continuity between normal and abnormal life. This book should be of interest to students and practitioners of psychology, clinical psychology, psychiatry and analysis.
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