The Clinical Application of the Theory of Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis--the one that we are familiar with--started in the clinical field. Freud and Breuer made some strides in the treatment of hysteria using hypnosis. They put together a theory of psychopathology based on two basic notions: conflicts between acceptable and unacceptable impulses (ideas, desires, fantasies, etc.), and the repression of the unacceptable impulses causing the formation of symptoms.