Stimulus transformation and learning theory in the production and treatment of an acute attack of benign paroxysmal peritonitis

Abstract

A case episode from the hypnoanalysis of a patient with benign paroxysmal peritonitis has been presented to illustrate the nature of stimulus transformation in symptom formation and maintenance. Perceptual distortion and the role of the perceptual system in facilitating stimulus transformation has been discussed. Hypnotherapeutic intervention was based upon the awareness of the role of perceptual alteration in facilitating differential response and was effective in terminating the attack, in its original form and in experimental revivification. The autonomous factor in learning has been discussed in relationship to the drive for activity and reenforcement and resistance to all possible forms of spontaneous or planned retroactive inhibition. Resistance in neurosis possesses the essentials of all well established learned responses—strength against extinction. Psychotherapy as a new learning experience will be resisted on a Gestalt basis—dynamically and neurally. The recognition of the role of involuntary neuropsychological mechanisms in the development and maintenance of neurotic learning is essential in the planning and study of those remedial efforts which we term psychotherapy.