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AGREEABLENESS AS OBSTACLE
Abstract
The author discusses excessive agreeableness as it appears in the analytic situation, the patient agreeing with all interpretations, accepting all the analyst suggests in such a way as to keep the treatment apparently ongoing and peaceful but actually semi-paralysed. This type of agreeableness is linked with what has been described in the literature under the rubric of compliance. The author aims to show the various ways in which this agreeableness is enacted in the relationship with the analyst, and then to explore further the kind of anxieties that this defensive structure tries to ward off. Material from an adolescent patient is used to describe the slow unravelling of very powerful anxieties about being invaded and taken over by her object, anxieties that lead to her having no life and no mind of her own. It is suggested that such deeply paranoid anxieties may unconsciously be present in other patients of this compliant, 'agreeable' type.
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“People high on agreeableness and low on self-esteem will have trouble saying no (cf. Joseph 2000; Judge and LePine 2007).”
From Energy Management of People in Organizations: A Review and Research Agenda (2011) · cites this paper as Joseph 2000
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Who are the most engaged at work? A meta‐analysis of personality and employee engagement
Young, H. R., Glerum, D. R., Wang, W., & Joseph, D. L. (2018) · Journal of Organizational Behavior · doi:10.1002/job.2303 · Cited by 260
Dynamic Systems Theories as a Metaframework for Psychoanalysis
Seligman, S. (2005) · Psychoanalytic Dialogues · doi:10.1080/10481881509348832 · Cited by 120
“From a quite different conceptual perspective, Betty Joseph (2000), the leading contemporary Kleinian, describes an analysis in which she and the analysand went along in a rather pleasant and apparently productive state, but with something somehow missing.”
BackgroundEnergy Management of People in Organizations: A Review and Research Agenda
Schippers, M. C., & Hogenes, R. (2011) · Journal of Business and Psychology · doi:10.1007/s10869-011-9217-6 · Cited by 91
Exploring the Relationship between Construction Workers’ Personality Traits and Safety Behavior
Gao, Y., González, V. A., & Yiu, T. W. (2019) · Journal of Construction Engineering and Management · doi:10.1061/(asce)co.1943-7862.0001763 · Cited by 94
Risking a relation: sex education and adolescent development
Gilbert, J. (2007) · Sex Education · doi:10.1080/14681810601134736 · Cited by 44
“These revolts can take many contradictory forms: sexual precociousness or a renunciation of sexual desire; passionate friendships where the distinction between self and other is blurred; isolation, self‐mutilation and the abnegation of bodily needs; risk‐taking—extreme sports, drug use, dangerous driving—or ‘excessive…”
BackgroundInfluentialThe Analyst's Desire and the Problem of Narcissistic Resistances
Wilson, M. (2003) · Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association · doi:10.1177/00030651030510012001 · Cited by 34
“Some comply by being seemingly agreeable (Joseph 2000); some rebel in subtle or not so subtle ways.”
BackgroundPersonality Traits Influence Clinical Outcome in Day Hospital-Treated Elderly Depressed Patients
Canuto, A., Giannakopoulos, P., Meiler‐Mititelu, C., Delaloye, C., Herrmann, F. R., & Weber, K. (2009) · American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry · doi:10.1097/jgp.0b013e3181987536 · Cited by 27
Addictions and the Quest to Control the Object
Waska, R. T. (2006) · The American Journal of Psychoanalysis · doi:10.1007/s11231-005-9002-2 · Cited by 15
The Dark Side of Analytic Conviction: Impasses of Omniscience and Complacency
Goldberg, S. H., & Grusky, Z. (2004) · Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association · doi:10.1177/00030651040520040701 · Cited by 9
“In these seminars, and in publications by this group of analysts (see Joseph 1989, 2000; Feldman 1993, 1997, 1999; Britton 1998; Spillius 1988; Steiner 1993; O’Shaughnessy 1992), there is an acknowledgment that to a considerable degree these enactments of the patient’s internal object world are…”
BackgroundStensson, J. (2001) · International Forum of Psychoanalysis · doi:10.1080/08037060152740098 · Cited by 3
“In the August issue of International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2000 (3) a paper by Betty Joseph was published: ‘Agreeableness as obstacle,’ in which she describes and discusses her work with a teenage girl.”
BackgroundThe Fictive Object and Disordered Attachments
Rubin, M. (2004) · Contemporary Psychoanalysis · doi:10.1080/00107530.2004.10745827 · Cited by 2
“The more the analysand is able to sustain real contact with the analyst, as opposed to pseudocooperation (Joseph, 1975, 2001), the better the therapeutic outcome.”
BackgroundWaska, R. T. (2010) · Psychoanalytic Social Work · doi:10.1080/15228878.2010.512264 · Cited by 1
“Joseph (2000) points out how some patients use compliance and agreeableness as a massive resistance to exposing their own minds.”
BackgroundLemma, A. (2003) · doi:10.1002/9780470713426.refs
The difficult search for belonging for Canadian-born Ismaili Muslim adolescents in Toronto, Canada
Virani-Murji, F. (2022) · Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy · doi:10.1080/15505170.2022.2094509
“Joseph (2000) argues that the problem with this type of defense is that it acts as an obstacle to allowing the ego to make insight from anxiety, to symbolize its effects, and to not fossilize the ego around its pitch.”
BackgroundResultInfluentialLemma, A. (2015) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781119150787.refs
Metadata
- Authors
- Joseph, B.
- Corresponding author
- Joseph, Betty
- Venue
- The International Journal of Psychoanalysis
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2000-08-07
- Volume
- 81
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 641-649
- ISSN
- 0020-7578 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2118395464
- Cited by
- 15
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2022: 1 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 1 · 2015: 1
- FWCI
- 1.35
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- The International Journal of Psychoanalysis (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Psychoanalysis and Psychopathology Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Psychology and Mental Health
- Social Sciences › Cultural Studies › Psychoanalysis and Social Critique
- Keywords
- compliance, analytic relationship, object relations, fortifications, adolescent patient, psychoanalytic treatment
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Anxiety, Female, Humans, Paranoid Disorders, Psychoanalytic Therapy
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