Psyche and the Split-Brain

by Jenny Yates

This book begins with the question of the relationship between the unconscious and the two hemispheres of the brain, initially wondering whether the right hemisphere's processing of visual spatial patterns is the way the unconscious mind processes the archetypal images. To study the question in the larger framework of the relation between the way the two hemispheres of the brain process image and language and Jungian ways of understanding the unconscious through archetypal images and the word association test. The author gave split-brain subjects Carl Jung's word association test, finding that emotional complexes facilitate the move of language across hemispheres in spite of physical disconnection, the reverse of Jung's finding that emotion blocks language recall when the hemispheres are intact. She also found that showing archetypal images from art evoked language from the supposedly silent hemisphere of the brain. Contents: PART I: Split-Brain Perception of Images; Introduction: Fish and Geese/Sky and Water; Direct Consciousness and Split-Brain Perception of Images/Symbols; Archetypal Unconscious and Split-Brain Perception of Images/Symbols; Emotion and Split-Brain Perception of Fairy Tale Images; Rorschach and Split-Brain Perception of Emotion; PART II: Split-Brain Perception of Language; Word Associations, Emotions, Split-Brain Patterns: Implications for Psychoanalysis; Psychological Typology in Split-Brain Individuals; Thinking/Feeling/Intuition/Sensation; Conclusion: The Psyche of Split-Brain Individuals.

106 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

Reviews

[Jeremy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Nonsensical Jungian psychobabble that offers no methodological constraints of any kind and attempts to draw significant scientific conclusions based on a sample group of two people. The author recommended it to me herself, but I will never have any idea why.