The Psychoanalytic Discourse Allows a Different Kind of Therapeutic Engagement in Psychosis

For the psychiatrist, negative symptoms are viewed as a sign of mental illness marked by a symbolic deficit. Symbolic deficit flags the imperative of the Real and as such is viewed in an utterly different way by the psychoanalyst who views all meaning-making – whether the phantasy of the neurotic or the positive symptom, the delusion of the psychotic - as a means of compensation, a means of constructing a symbolic solution in the face of the Real.…