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Unintentional racial microaggressions and the social unconscious
Abstract
This article explores the social unconscious as it is manifested through unintentional racial microaggressions. It is based on a heuristic self‐search inquiry conducted by the first author, as a result of a comment made in a class in a psychotherapy education/training program, which she subsequently examined further in a Master's dissertation, supervised by the second author. The article firstly elaborates a number of contexts, that is, the immediate context that provoked the research which forms the basis of this article; the broader social context of racism in Aotearoa New Zealand and the research context, namely heuristics. This is followed by two brief discussions of racial enactments and unconscious associations, which introduce the second part of the article in which the findings of the research are presented with regard to the social unconscious, specifically, unconscious racialization, racialized positioning, and dissociated racial self‐states.
... The research on which this article is based has its origins in a racial microaggression experienced by the first author, which, eventually, led to her conducting a heuristic enquiry into this, supervised by the second author (McCann, 2022). From that research, the authors have published one article that focused on the psychodynamics of racial microaggressions, specifically with regard to the social unconscious (McCann & Tudor, 2022), and have written another that focuses on the heuristic process of (re-)discovering the racial enactments and unconscious associations the microaggression represented (McCann & Tudor, 2024). This article focuses on the implications of this research for the profession of psychotherapy, introducing this by positioning the first author (who is the first person "I", "me", "my" and "myself" in this article), and acknowledging the context of the research. ...
... Brown (2001) describes processes of the social unconscious as manifesting in the form of common assumptions, disavowals, social defences (such as projection, denial and avoidance), and structural oppression (see also McCann & Tudor, 2022). According to Layton (2006), "normative unconscious processes" refer to "that aspect of the unconscious that pulls to repeat patterns that uphold the very social norms that cause psychic distress in the first place" (p. ...
Unintentional racial and cultural microaggressions towards indigenous and minority peoples while injurious to recipients, are characteristically not recognised by the perpetrator and when challenged, are often not able to be met with curiosity or the capacity for reflection. The difference in racial and cultural realities exposed in these encounters can lead to breakdowns in recognition and polarising dynamics which perpetuate structural oppression. They also represent missed opportunities for greater understanding of the ways socially sanctioned norms, assumptions and beliefs reinforce the implicit positioning of self and other as racial and cultural objects. Through consideration of the societal, interpersonal and intrapsychic aspects of the first author’s experience through heuristic enquiry (supervised by the second author), we consider unintentional racial microaggressive encounters and challenges as the observable outcome of implicit racialisation into colonial society. This article presents some discussion and implications for the discipline or profession of psychotherapy.
... You probably won't be surprised about-and won't want to read-a recent chapter of mine which takes a similar, though more theoretical perspective about working with settlers about their/our relationship with being a settler (Tudor, 2025a). Of course, as a psychotherapist, I am interested in the unconscious as well as the conscious, and, as you say, 'emotional and visceral reactions', but these cut both ways (McCann & Tudor, 2024); I want to help people understand, for instance, the origins of their internalised racism, and to think about this in relation to the social unconscious (McCann & Tudor, 2022). Also, a similar fact-check on your comments on Tommy Robinson reveals that he has been convicted of assault twice (for one of which offences he served a 12-month prison term)-and has also been convicted of using threatening, abusive, or insulting behaviour. ...
Following Colin Feltham’s article in this issue (Feltham, 2025), and Keith Tudor’s response (Tudor, 2025b), also published in this issue, the article comprises a series of exchanges between the two authors. It encompasses some discussion—or statements—about beliefs and values; differences of ideology; the use of language; equality and equity; and the nature of psychotherapy. The impetus for the exchange was based on the hope of some rapprochement between the two authors’ views but, in this sense, the project failed. The necessary unfolding of divergent views does not reach any positive conclusions but, at least, airs significant sticking points held by practitioners in the field, about both the content and process of differences, positions, and argument. Nevertheless, and notwithstanding their profound and unresolved differences, both authors hope that, together with the two preceding articles, the whole exchange will stand as a case study regarding conflict about culture and identity in the profession and serve to stimulate further questions.
... 2018; Harrison & Tudor, 2020); psychological infanticide (Sherwood, 2019); ambivalence in psychotherapy (Lyons, 2021); humour in psychotherapy (Ciurlionis, 2021); abrupt endings (Chue, 2021); and racial microaggressions (McCann, 2022;McCann & Tudor, 2022)-all of which represent quite a range of enquiry. ...
Hanley et al. offer an overview of core principles of quantitative research and how these might be used to answer descriptive, comparative or relationship-based research questions. Following on from this, the authors discuss adventurous projects attempting to articulate a theory of change for online therapeutic services. An overarching mixed methods design is described before going on to discuss the way that quantitative methods have been used to complement earlier qualitative research. The authors share two examples of projects where the research team have attempted to keep the individuals seeking support at the fore of what is being measured, one reporting the use of an idiographic measure (the GBO) and one a hybrid nomothetic/idiographic measure (the SWAN-OM) in real-world therapeutic work. Both these studies highlight the utility of using these measures in web-based therapeutic work. The authors reflect upon the strengths and limitations of this work, concluding that while quantitative research is always reductive, there are ways of collecting numerical information that can place the individuals seeking support in the driving seat of what is being assessed. Whilst this adds an element of complexity to the understanding gained from such measures, it can help to humanise the numbers being collected and has the potential to enhance the therapeutic work engaged in.
Requiring disciplined and critical self-reflection and engagement in a process of discovery—of self and others—heuristic research is a method of psychological research close to the practice of therapy. Drawing on the pioneering work of Moustakas (Heuristic research: Design, methodology and applications. Sage, 1990) as well as other heuristic researchers, notably Sela-Smith (Journal of Humanistic Psychology 42:53–88, 2002), the author of chapter 4 summarises key concepts of the heuristic method and methodology with illustrations from the literature, his own heuristic research, and some research students. This chapter discusses key concepts of heurism which acknowledge its methodology and philosophical roots, and takes the reader through the various stages or processes of heuristic research.
Social behavior is ordinarily treated as being under conscious (if not always thoughtful) control. However, considerable evidence now supports the view that social behavior often operates in an implicit or unconscious fashion. The identifying feature of implicit cognition is that past experience influences judgment in a fashion not introspectively known by the actor. The present conclusion—that attitudes, self-esteem, and stereotypes have important implicit modes of operation—extends both the construct validity and predictive usefulness of these major theoretical constructs of social psychology. Methodologically, this review calls for increased use of indirect measures—which are imperative in studies of implicit cognition. The theorized ordinariness of implicit stereotyping is consistent with recent findings of discrimination by people who explicitly disavow prejudice. The finding that implicit cognitive effects are often reduced by focusing judges’ attention on their judgment task provides a basis for evaluating applications (such as affirmative action) aimed at reducing such unintended discrimination.
Unintentional racial microaggressions towards indigenous and minority peoples while injurious to recipients, are often not recognised by the perpetrator, and when challenged, are commonly met with defensiveness. The difference in racial realities exposed in these encounters can lead to breakdowns in recognition, and polarizing dynamics which perpetuate racial division. They also represent missed opportunities for greater understanding. In this dissertation, I use a vignette of events that occurred during a training course in psychotherapy as an entry point into considering the question, "what meaning may be made regarding unconscious racialisation from making, encountering and challenging unintentional racial microaggressions as a person of mixed 'race' in Aotearoa New Zealand". Through my subjective consideration of the intrapsychic, interpersonal and societal aspects of this phenomenon through heuristic inquiry, I contribute to the therapist's consideration of the mutual influence of unconscious racialisation on the therapeutic encounter. I explore the interplay of subjectivities within the racialised transference-countertransference matrix, and consider how reparational 'I and thou' engagement can be facilitated when unintentional racial microaggressions occur.
This paper reviews significant aspects of the work of Trigant Burrow (1875–1950), an early psychoanalyst who, while less well known than many of his contemporaries, was, as a number of commentators have argued, well ahead of his time. This article discusses four areas of his theory: the preconscious, the nest instinct, and the love subject; primary unity, primary intersubjectivity, and the “I” persona; social images, social neurosis, and the social unconscious; and, finally, group, community, and society. The article argues that the study of Burrow's work is important, firstly, in recognizing the historical antecedents of what may be viewed as a social turn in both psychoanalysis and psychotherapy; and, secondly, in helping psychoanalytic thinking to be more open to diversity with regard to marginalized theory and people.
This article identifies and explores how the internalised racism of racial minority clients is identified and treated clinically by white psychotherapists. Four psychotherapists, who selfidentified as “white”, participated in semi-structured interviews, exploring their perceptions and understandings of how internalised racism and racism manifested within the clinical setting. The data from these interviews was analysed using thematic analysis and produced four main themes: manifestations of internalised racism and racism in therapy, disidentification, therapist’s explicitness, and connection to culture. These themes were supported and anchored by four sub-themes. The themes represent a therapeutic process of: emergence, understanding, intervention and aim. The emergence of racism and internalised racism in therapy describes both the clients’ and the psychotherapists’ experiences of internalised racism and racism as it emerges in the therapeutic encounter. Dis-identification captures the psychotherapists’ understanding of internalised racism operating as their minority clients’ dis-identification with their racial and cultural heritage. Therapist’s explicitness identifies a therapeutic intervention, the psychotherapist’s communication to their minority clients about the racial differences between them. And finally, connection to culture captures the psychotherapist’s therapeutic aim of encouraging a connection to racial and cultural heritage as a protective factor against racism and emotional and psychological difficulties. Whakarāpopotonga E tautuhi e tūhura ana tēnei tuhinga pēhea ai te tautuhi te whakaora a ngā kaiwhakaora hinengaro kirimā i te aukatinga iwi ā-roto o ngā kiritaki tokoiti. Tokowhā ngā kaiwhakaora hinengaro, whakatau “kirimā”, i uru mai ki ngā uiuinga kōkau, e tūhura ana i ō rātau whakaaro, mātauranga hoki he pēhea te putanga mai o te aukatinga iwi ā-roto i waenga i te nōhanga haumanu. I whāia te aromatawaihanga kaupapa hai aromatawai i te raraunga o ēnei uiuinga, ā, e whā ngā kaupapa i puta ake: ngā tohu o te aukatinga iwi ā-roto me te aukati iwi i roto i te haumanu, te tuakiri-ui, te mārama o te kaihaumanu me te here ki te ahurea. E whā ngā kaupapa huiroto tuatoko, taunaki hoki i ēnei kaupapa. He kanohitanga ēnei kaupapa i te tukanga haumanu o te: pueatanga, te māramatanga, te whakaurutanga me te whāinga. Te pueatanga ake o te aukatinga iwi me te aukatinga iwi ā-roto i rō haumanutanga e whakaāhua ana i te whaiaro aukatinga iwi ā-roto me te aukatinga iwi hoki o te kiritaki rāuatahi ko te kaiwhakaora hinengaro i te wā haumanutanga. E mau ana i te tuakiri-ui te tirohanga a ngā kaiwhakaora hinengaro o te aukatinga iwi ā-roto whakamahia ai hai tuakiri-whakaui pānga iwi, tuakiri-whakaui ahurea o ō rātau kiritaki tokoiti. He whakaaturanga haumanu aukati te whakamārama koi ā ngā kaihaumanu, ko te whakatau a te kaiwhakaora hinengaro ki ā rātau kiritaki tokoiti mō te rerekētanga iwi i waenga i a rātau. I te mutunga, ko te here ki te ahurea e hopu ana i te whāinga haumanu ā te kaiwhakaora hinengaro, arā ki te whakatenatena herenga tuku iho ā-iwi, ā-ahurea hai mea haumarutanga atu i te aukatinga iwi, whakararutanga kare ā-roto, hinengaro.
Objectives
Racism is an important health determinant that contributes to ethnic health inequities. This study sought to describe New Zealand adults’ reported recent experiences of racism over a 10 year period. It also sought to examine the association between recent experience of racism and a range of negative health and wellbeing measures.
Methods
The study utilised previously collected data from multiple cross-sectional national surveys (New Zealand Health Surveys 2002/03, 2006/07, 2011/12; and General Social Surveys 2008, 2010, 2012) to provide prevalence estimates of reported experience of racism (in the last 12 months) by major ethnic groupings in New Zealand. Meta-analytical techniques were used to provide improved estimates of the association between recent experience of racism and negative health from multivariable models, for the total cohorts and stratified by ethnicity.
Results
Reported recent experience of racism was highest among Asian participants followed by Māori and Pacific peoples, with Europeans reporting the lowest experience of racism. Among Asian participants, reported experience of racism was higher for those born overseas compared to those born in New Zealand. Recent experience of racism appeared to be declining for most groups over the time period examined. Experience of racism in the last 12 months was consistently associated with negative measures of health and wellbeing (SF-12 physical and mental health component scores, self-rated health, overall life satisfaction). While exposure to racism was more common in the non-European ethnic groups, the impact of recent exposure to racism on health was similar across ethnic groups, with the exception of SF-12 physical health.
Conclusions
The higher experience of racism among non-European groups remains an issue in New Zealand and its potential effects on health may contribute to ethnic health inequities. Ongoing focus and monitoring of racism as a determinant of health is required to inform and improve interventions.
Most robots currently being sold or developed are either stylized with white material or have a metallic appearance. In this research we used the shooter bias paradigm and several questionnaires to investigate if people automatically identify robots as being racialized, such that we might say that some robots are 'White' while others are 'Asian', or 'Black'. To do so, we conducted an extended replication of the classic social psychological shooter bias paradigm using robot stimuli to explore whether effects known from human-human intergroup experiments would generalize to robots that were racialized as Black and White. Reaction-time based measures revealed that participants demonstrated 'shooter-bias' toward both Black people and robot racialized as Black. Participants were also willing to attribute a race to the robots depending on their racialization and demonstrated a high degree of inter-subject agreement when it came to these attributions.
Intolerance toward indigenous people is a common feature of colonial societies, and New Zealand is no exception. Despite aspirations of equality, evidence suggests that discrimination toward Māori remains pervasive and may relate to continued inequalities in social, economic, and psychological domains. This article analyzes self-report questionnaire data from 1,790 Māori sampled as part of the New Zealand Attitudes and Values Study. We describe a Bayesian regression model assessing the links between perceived discrimination and 15 social, economic, and psychological indicators of well-being (including health care access, evaluation of own health, job security, self-esteem, life satisfaction, and psychological distress). The model adjusts for relevant covariates (including age, ethnicity, gender, and income). Forty-three percent of the sample reported experiencing either some discrimination or high levels of discrimination. Higher levels of perceived discrimination among Māori were associated with poorer outcomes in every measure, across multiple domains. This study demonstrates that New Zealand’s “bi-cultural” aspirations are far from realized, and should raise concerns for all countries with a history of colonisation. We call for more research on the incidences and impact of various forms of discrimination throughout New Zealand society, specifically in relation to the perpetuation of Māori disadvantage.
Three studies tested basic assumptions derived from a theoretical model based on the dissociation of automatic and controlled processes involved in prejudice. Study 1 supported the model's assumption that high- and low-prejudice persons are equally knowledgeable of the cultural stereotype. The model suggests that the stereotype is automatically activated in the presence of a member (or some symbolic equivalent) of the stereotyped group and that low-prejudice responses require controlled inhibition of the automatically activated stereotype. Study 2, which examined the effects of automatic stereotype activation on the evaluation of ambiguous stereotype-relevant behaviors performed by a race-unspecified person, suggested that when subjects' ability to consciously monitor stereotype activation is precluded, both high- and low-prejudice subjects produce stereotype-congruent evaluations of ambiguous behaviors. Study 3 examined high- and low-prejudice subjects' responses in a consciously directed thought-listing task. Consistent with the model, only low-prejudice subjects inhibited the automatically activated stereotype-congruent thoughts and replaced them with thoughts reflecting equality and negations of the stereotype. The relation between stereotypes and prejudice and implications for prejudice reduction are discussed.
Introduction
Achieving health equity for indigenous and ethnic minority populations requires the development of an ethnically diverse health workforce. This study explores a tertiary admission programme targeting Māori and Pacific applicants to nursing, pharmacy and health sciences (a precursor to medicine) at the University of Auckland (UoA), Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ). Application of cognitive and non-cognitive selection tools, including a Multiple Mini Interview (MMI), are examined.
Methods
Indigenous Kaupapa Māori methodology guided analysis of the Māori and Pacific Admission Scheme (MAPAS) for the years 2008–2012. Multiple logistic regression models were used to identify the predicted effect of admission variables on the final MAPAS recommendation of best starting point for success in health professional study i.e. ‘CertHSc’ (Certificate in Health Sciences, bridging/foundation), ‘Bachelor’ (degree-level) or ‘Not FMHS’ (Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences). Regression analyses controlled for interview year, gender and ancestry.
Results
Of the 918 MAPAS interviewees: 35% (319) were Māori, 58% (530) Pacific, 7% (68) Māori/Pacific; 71% (653) school leavers; 72% (662) females. The average rank score was 167/320, 40–80 credits below guaranteed FMHS degree offers. Just under half of all interviewees were recommended ‘CertHSc’ 47% (428), 13% (117) ‘Bachelor’ and 38% (332) ‘Not FMHS’ as the best starting point. Strong associations were identified between Bachelor recommendation and exposure to Any 2 Sciences (OR:7.897, CI:3.855-16.175; p < 0.0001), higher rank score (OR:1.043, CI:1.034-1.052; p < 0.0001) and higher scores on MAPAS mathematics test (OR:1.043, CI:1.028-1.059; p < 0.0001). MMI stations had mixed associations, with academic preparation and career aspirations more consistently associated with recommendations.
Conclusions
Our findings raise concerns about the ability of the secondary education sector to prepare Māori and Pacific students adequately for health professional study. A comprehensive tertiary admissions process using multiple tools for selection (cognitive and non-cognitive) and the provision of alternative entry pathways are recommended for indigenous and ethnic minority health workforce development. The application of the MMI within an equity and indigenous cultural context can support a holistic assessment of an applicant’s potential to succeed within tertiary study. The new MAPAS admissions process may provide an exemplar for other tertiary institutions looking to widen participation via equity-targeted admission processes.
Constructive dialogues on race have been proposed as a means to heal racial and ethnic divides, reduce prejudice and misinformation, increase racial literacy, and foster improved race relations. Studies on the psychology of racial dialogues indicate social and academic norms that dictate against race talk between White Americans and persons of color: (a) the politeness protocol, (b) the academic protocol, and (c) the color-blind protocol. These protocols discourage race talk and allow society to enter into a conspiracy of silence regarding the detrimental impact oppression plays on persons of color. Facilitating difficult dialogues on race requires educators to recognize what makes such discussions difficult. For people of color, engaging in race talk exposes them to microaggressions that invalidate and assail their racial/ethnic identities. For Whites, honest discussions are impeded by fears of appearing racist, of realizing their racism, of acknowledging White privilege, and of taking responsibility to combat racism.
Response latency measures have yielded an explosion of interest in implicit attitudes. Less forthcoming have been theoretical explanations for why they often differ from explicit (self-reported) attitudes. Theorized differences in the sources of implicit and explicit attitudes are discussed, and evidence consistent with each theory is presented. The hypothesized causal influences on attitudes include early (even preverbal) experiences, affective experiences, cultural biases, and cognitive consistency principles. Each may influence implicit attitudes more than explicit attitudes, underscoring their conceptual distinction.
Although the concept of the Social Unconscious has increased in importance in the group analytic literature recently, there are still many misconceptions and misunderstandings about it and its practical applications. While some papers define the term, there are no papers explaining the basics of the social unconscious and what it includes. The purpose of this article is to address the misconceptions, describe the basic building blocks of the social unconscious, and develop a working definition for this complex term.
Moustakas has made a significant contribution to research in psychology by describing the heuristic research method. This is a way of inquiring into what Wilber has identified as the Upper Left quadrant, or individual internal experience, and what Polanyi referred to as tacit knowledge, which is deeply embedded knowledge not normally available to conscious awareness. However, this article suggests that due to unacknowledged resistance to experiencing unbearable pain, Moustakas’s research focus shifted from the self’s experience of the experience to focusing on the idea of the experience. This shift resulted in a model of ambivalence, as reflected in the differences between what he introduced as his theory of heuristics and what he presented as its application. A clarification of the Moustakas method is presented to overcome ambivalence by recognizing resistance.
This is a copy of the paper read at the fourteenth annual meeting of the American Psychopathological Association in Philadelphia on June 7, 1924. The author believes that in order to form a conception of our unconscious mass mind and its social condensations it is required that we forego our present absolute basis of evaluations residing in the private judgment of the individual and that instead we assume a basis which being relative to and inclusive of our mental and social processes will envisage both on the basis of a more universal and encompassing evaluation.
abstract The author argues in this paper that, because of racism, there is an asymmetrical power relationship between black and white which saturates all aspects of society. Whilst this dynamic also permeates psychoanalytic training organizations the problem is frequently ignored or denied. This colour-blind position fails to see or acknowledge difference and hence the white individual is able to avoid the shame involved in owning any racist thought. For the black trainee an important aspect of their identity and experience is not allowed expression, making the training experience a difficult one. However, the paper argues that the inability to acknowledge and think about racism has implications, not only for potential black applicants and patients, but also for the professional organizations and their predominantly white members as this cordial form of racism prevents thought and does damage to both white and black.
Although psychology has an ample vocabulary for describing individual pathologies, the development of theory and concepts for understanding societal pathology remains in its infancy. Because community psychology theory views human behavior in its context, it is essential that interventions not be limited to stress management, personal coping, and similar programming. Interventions should not leave social injustice undiscussed and unchallenged. In this spirit we present a theory of oppression and sociopolitical development that informs an intervention with young, African American men in an urban setting. The five-stage theory highlights the role of Freire's notion of critical consciousness, a sociopolitical version of critical thinking, in enhancing an awareness of sociopolitical as well as personal forces that influence behavior. The theory also draws on African American social-change traditions and their spiritual aspects. The action section of the study describes the Young Warriors program's use of mass culture (rap videos and film) as stimuli for the development of critical consciousness. Highlights from an empirical investigation of an eight-session high school version of the program will be presented to illustrate the practical challenges and benefits of sociopolitical interventions.
Background:
Racism is an underlying cause of ethnic health inequities both in Aotearoa New Zealand and internationally. It is timely to synthesise racism and health research within New Zealand particularly given the current policy environment and shift towards addressing the health effects of racism.
Aim:
To review quantitative research examining self-reported experiences of racial discrimination and associations with measures of health (health conditions, health risk, health status and healthcare) in New Zealand.
Methods:
MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Web of Science and CINAHL databases were searched for studies reporting on associations between experiences of racism and health.
Results:
The systematic review identified 24 quantitative studies reporting associations between self-reported racial discrimination across a wide range of health measures including mental health, physical health, self-rated health, wellbeing, individual level health risks, and healthcare indicators.
Conclusions:
Quantitative racism and health research in New Zealand consistently finds that self-reported racial discrimination is associated with a range of poorer health outcomes and reduced access to and quality of healthcare. This review confirms that experience of racial discrimination is an important determinant of health in New Zealand, as it is internationally. There is a pressing need for effectively designed interventions to address the impacts of racism on health.
As psychoanalysis teaches, things are rarely what they seem to be. Micro-aggressions are complex enactments illustrating how we embody race in psychoanalysis, history defining the future in fleeting moments that endure. Through my own personal story, as well as, being deeply familiar with analytic institute life, a deconstruction of the micro-aggressive moment is offered, revealing it to be anything but “micro” and fundamentally paradoxical. The familiar surprise of micro-aggression is made up of contemporaneous self-state switches forged from unconscious trans-generational trauma and lived history, and shaped by the structural context of an institute. After describing the many ways dissociated micro-aggressive experiences author an individual’s and an institute’s narrative, suggestions to increase racial safety in institutes are offered, including: antidotes to the inevitability of micro-aggression and shame in analytic training, guidelines for more open communication about race, the necessity for historical self-disclosure to discover hidden similarities of difference, the shared burden of only-ness and the need for kinship networks to encourage differentiation of the self as well as systemic change. Finally, a proposal is offered for how analytic institutes might ally to create more balanced racial representation.
This paper examines racialized countertransferences and how these countertransferences impact treatment dyads. I explicate the ways in which clinicians may unconsciously avoid racialized dynamics within themselves and within treatments. Case examples are used to portray how race manifests within countertransference and how we might understand these types of countertransference reactions. Finally, I encourage further reflectiveness and openness related to race within ourselves and within our treatments.
I speak here to what I feel is a necessary reckoning, for myself and for our field, with U.S. history, particularly the intersecting history of White supremacy and White class dominance. I look at this history’s continuing effects on clinicians, on the people clinicians treat, and on psychoanalytic institutions. The paper draws on Avery Gordon’s concept of the ghost as a figure that pushes to make visible a psychosocial violence that has taken place—and that demands a something-to-be-done. I examine the way in which psychosocial unconscious processes simultaneously press toward truth and toward a disavowal of truth, disavowals that, in this context, serve to restore psychic equilibrium to unsettled White psyches. I turn to nonpsychoanalytic as well as psychoanalytic ancestors and contemporaries to elaborate an ethic of dis-illusionment that stands in tension with and in opposition to an ethic of adaptation. I conclude with a clinical vignette of exemplary work in a White–White dyad.
Aim
To determine the contribution of avoidable causes of death to the life expectancy differentials in both Māori and Pacific compared with non-Māori/non-Pacific ethnic groups in New Zealand.
Method
Death registration data and population data for New Zealand between 2013–15 was used to calculate life expectancy. A recent definition of avoidable mortality was used to identify potentially avoidable deaths. Life expectancy decomposition was undertaken to identify the contribution of avoidable causes of death to the life expectancy differential in the Māori and Pacific populations.
Results
Nearly half of all deaths in Pacific (47.3%) and over half in Māori (53.0%) can be attributed to potentially avoidable causes of death, compared with less than one quarter (23.2%) in the non-Māori/non-Pacific population. Conditions both preventable and amenable contribute the greatest to the life expectancy differentials within both ethnic groups, when compared with non-Māori/non-Pacific. Cancers of the trachea, bronchus and lung are significant avoidable causes contributing to the life expectancy differentials in both male and female Māori, contributing 0.8 years and 0.9 years respectively. Avoidable injuries including suicide contribute 1.0 year to the differential in Māori males. Coronary disease, diabetes and cerebrovascular disease are the largest contributors to the differential in both Pacific males and females.
Conclusion
Avoidable causes of death are large contributors to the life expectancy differentials in Māori and Pacific populations. The findings provide further evidence of the need to address the determinants of health and ensure equitable access to health services to reduce the impact of avoidable mortality on inequalities in life expectancy. It also highlights the importance of looking beyond individual factors and recognising the role of healthcare services and the social determinants in improving health equity.
Analysing unconscious anxieties and defences is essential to psychoanalytically informed approaches, including group analysis. While psychoanalysis focuses on the intrapsychic reality of the individual, group analysis studies the interrelations between intrapsychic and social realities as they are revealed in groups. Here, the concept of the ‘social unconscious’ has gained prominence in recent years. However, while there is an extensive body of work on the unconscious in psychoanalysis, the group analytic concept of the ‘social unconscious’ and its clinical applications are less well understood. In the first part of the article, theoretical contributions towards defining the ‘social unconscious’ are critically reviewed and discussed. In the second part of the article, the possibilities and limitations of the concept for understanding psychosocial processes are examined in relation to an anonymised vignette from a mentalization-informed psychotherapy group for young adults with a range of emotional difficulties. The article concludes with a summary and reflections.
Michel Foucault has become famous for a series of books that have permanently altered our understanding of many institutions of Western society. He analyzed mental institutions in the remarkable Madness and Civilization; hospitals in The Birth of the Clinic; prisons in Discipline and Punish; and schools and families in The History of Sexuality. But the general reader as well as the specialist is apt to miss the consistent purposes that lay behind these difficult individual studies, thus losing sight of the broad social vision and political aims that unified them.Now, in this superb set of essays and interviews, Foucault has provided a much-needed guide to Foucault. These pieces, ranging over the entire spectrum of his concerns, enabled Foucault, in his most intimate and accessible voice, to interpret the conclusions of his research in each area and to demonstrate the contribution of each to the magnificent -- and terrifying -- portrait of society that he was patiently compiling.For, as Foucault shows, what he was always describing was the nature of power in society; not the conventional treatment of power that concentrates on powerful individuals and repressive institutions, but the much more pervasive and insidious mechanisms by which power "reaches into the very grain of individuals, touches their bodies and inserts itself into their actions and attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives"Foucault's investigations of prisons, schools, barracks, hospitals, factories, cities, lodgings, families, and other organized forms of social life are each a segment of one of the most astonishing intellectual enterprises of all time -- and, as this book proves, one which possesses profound implications for understanding the social control of our bodies and our minds.
An initial attempt is made to discern more details in Foulkes's concept of the social unconscious, relating it to his deeper levels of group communication where it connects with, transcends and penetrates the individual unconscious revealed by psychoanalysis. The work of Earl Hopper is called upon as well as the findings of workshops conducted by the European Association for Transcultural Group Analysis. A tentative classification is proposed involving assumptions, disavowals, social defences and structural oppression representing blocks to communication and awareness within the field of relationships described by Giovanni Lo Verso as collective, transpersonal and transgenerational.
This paper begins with an analysis of race as a social construction and then follows the argument that, at a deep structural level, race and racism are organized by the same rational–irrational polarity of Enlightenment philosophy that informs psychoanalytic structural theory. The heart of the paper is formed by two case examples, one from my own practice and one from Leary (1997). I argue that unconscious racism is to be expected in our clinical work at this point in history and that truly reparative efforts depend on an acknowledgement of racism in the transference–countertransference matrix.
An account is given of the intellectual process by means of which I wrote my first book, White Racism: A Psychohistory. The process included an incorporation of society and history into the discourse of the unconscious—that is, a way of treating external reality nonreductively while remaining faithful to a radical depth psychology.
The study of aggression is essential to understanding traumatized social systems and especially large groups, whose unconscious life is characterized by a fourth basic assumption termed ‘Incohesion: Aggregation/Massification’ or (ba ) ‘I:A/M’. Aggregation and Massification are bi-polar and oscillating social, cultural and political states. Traumatized crustacean, contact-shunning characters tend to personify aggregation, and traumatized amoeboid merger-hungry characters, states of massification, and each type expresses aggression in characteristic ways. Aggression and aggressive feelings are the essence of aggregation, but the development and maintenance of massification depend on the expression of specific forms of aggression. When incohesion prevails, effective leadership is extremely difficult.
Discusses heuristics as an approach to human science research and suggests that, in its purest form, heuristics is a passionate and discerning personal involvement in problem solving, an effort to know the essence of some aspect of life through the internal pathways of the self. The private and imaginative nature of heuristic inquiry introduces a unique challenge in research investigations and in philosophical conceptualizations of human science. When utilized as a framework for research, it offers a disciplined pursuit of essential meanings connected with everyday human experiences. Through discussion of its inherent processes and values, the present authors develop a fresh perspective for the understanding and application of a heuristic approach to scientific investigation. Their aim is to awaken and inspire researchers to make contact with and respect their own questions and problems and to suggest a process that affirms imagination, intuition, self-reflection, and the tacit dimension as valid ways in the search for knowledge and understanding. It is concluded that competence and skill can be learned only through practice. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Presents the author's presidential address to the Society of Counseling Psychology, Division 17 of the American Psychological Association. The author discusses the social injustice of racism and why such a topic is relevant to counseling psychology. The following topics are discussed: (1) Three manifestations of racism; (2) Defining racism as pathology or a mental disorder is problematic; (3) Racism is more normative than we like to believe; (4) It is not the white supremacist but the ordinary citizen who perpetrates the greatest harm to people of color; (5) Racism harms white folks as well; and (6) Acknowledging our own racism is not enough. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
An analyst who is unaware of the constraints of social facts and forces will be insensitive to their unconscious recreation within therapeutic situations, and unable to provide space for patients to imagine how their identities have been formed at particular social and political junctures. The concepts of the social unconscious and of equivalence are defined and located within the traditions of Group Analysis and British Object Relations Theory. A model of maturity is outlined, the central element of which is the willingness and ability to take the role of citizen. These ideas are illustrated with clinical vignettes from psychoanalysis and group analysis.