The dreams and the ego-psychology

The Ego-psychology has made a new approach to the dream interpretation and its use in psychotherapy. As distinct from the classical psychoanalysis, which focuses on the latent contents of the dream, it emphasizes the secondary revision of the dream, which is much closer to secondary thinking processes. It is the Ego which plays the most important part in their origin, being the central and directive part of the personality and reflecting the dreamer's characteristics throughout various single dreams or their series. Starting from the basic assumptions of the Ego-psychology, developed by Hartmann, Kris and Loewenstein, the Ego-psychologists' present achievements have made a great contribution to the theory of dreams (Fisher and Grenberg) by considering dreaming as a regressive phenomenon, during which the Ego- catexia is lost, whereas sleeping with dreams may be supposed to allow of a recatexia of the Ego. Making use of the sleeping processes, the Ego makes a new arrangement in the psychic economics, being able to make restitution to the dreamer's psychism. The interpretation of manifested dreams is to-day a rule rather than an exception.