Citation

Sandage SJ. Psychoanal. Psychol. 2012; 29(1): 17-33.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2012, American Psychological Association)

DOI

10.1037/a0024897

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

A qualitative case study is described of a man who died from suicide after incarceration, which is part of a larger multimethod family case study. Hermeneutical phenomenological analyses in this study were based on personal archival documents he collected during his incarceration and interpreted theoretically using Kohutian self psychology and McAdams' narrative theory of personality. Based on procedures from prior research, texts were coded for narrative themes of tragedy and irony, as well as expressions of selfobject needs (i.e., mirroring, idealization, twinship).

RESULTS depicted prominent themes of (a) tragedy, (b) irony, (c) twinship hunger, and (d) idealization/twinship avoidance. Exploratory analyses suggested some preliminary support for tragedy themes being associated with avoidance of idealization and twinship needs and irony themes being associated with hunger for mirroring and twinship. Implications are considered for psychoanalytic theory and future empirical research on both suicide and narrative selfhood. © 2011 American Psychological Association.

Language: en

Keywords

adult; human; suicide; Suicide; male; alcoholism; case report; personality; Personality; qualitative research; psychology; case study; article; psychoanalysis; clinical research; Psychoanalysis; exploratory research; Narrative; Self psychology