NEUROPHYSIOLOGICAL BASIS OF GUIDED AFFECTIVE IMAGERY AS A PSYCHODYNAMIC DIRECTION OF PSYCHOTHERAPY

Abstract

The article is devoted to theoretical analysis of the neurophysiological basis of the imagination technique of psychodynamic psychotherapy. Brain structures that are involved in creating and maintaining an image of an object that is not currently present or was not present in the subject’s sensory field has been described. The Default mode network is considered as a probable substrate of Guided affective imagery in particular and psychotherapeutic changes in general. The process of Guided affective imagery is characterized, which allows to implement recontextualization and re-consolidation of past experience.

Guided affective imagery (GAI) is a hierarchically organized and structured system of techniques and principles of psychotherapeutic use of imagination. Guided affective imagery is a psychodynamic psychotherapy, which makes unconscious motivations, conflicts and defense mechanisms visible with the aid of images from within and deals with these unconscious matters.

The process of imagination is based on the ability of brain neurons to create and maintain an idea of an object, that is currently not present in the sensory environment of the subject, and also to combine the previously obtained perceptual images to create the original “products”.

The process of imagination involves the structure of the left temporal particle, the prefrontal and parietal region up to the temporal particle of the brain. The idea of the point of view of others and the creation of imagery (imagination) are specific cases of a more general process of “self-projection”, that involves the medial, parietal and frontal lobe, or the Default mode network (DMN) .

The Default mode network is probably the ground for psychotherapeutic changes in general, and the  psychotherapeutic process can modulate these brain structures. 

Guided affective imagery is able to enhance the psychotherapeutic process by activating the primary process and positive emotions. Guided affective imagery provides conditions for the establishment of such therapeutic  relationship, which makes possible the recontextualisation and reconsolidation of past experience. The result is a new set of implicit memories, so person operates on the basis of another psychic landscape, which leads to a new behavior and a new experience in the present and future.