The hysterical symptom: A proposal of articulation of the Freudian theory and the Bayesian account

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Freudian theory of the hysterical symptom conceives it as a form of symbolic solution to an unresolved psychic conflict that has been repressed. A large section of Freud's early psychological writings is dedicated to the theoretical discussion of how a part of the body can be used as a symbol. This theory establishes a correlation between bodily experience and the experience of psychic conflict. This correlation can be contingent or metaphoric, and makes the bodily experience the symbol of the conflict. This theory fits the proposal of the Bayesian brain approach to the conversion symptoms (or Functional Motor and Sensory Symptom, FMSS). The precision of prior beliefs and prediction errors in the generation of what we perceive is modulated by attention. The cause of the FMSS can be considered as produced by abnormal priors to which excessive precision is given, thus leading to false perceptual inferences to explain the emergence of belief at the intermediate level. In the psychic conflict, too much precision is given to the sensory evidence coming from the desire, increasing uncertainty. As this fact results in the impossibility of experiencing the conflict and managing the affective overload, the attention is directed to the organic symptom that was available concomitantly to which the excessive precision is transferred. This paper intends to approximate the Freudian view of the conversion symptom and the Bayesian approach, showing that the articulation between symbolic reading and neuroscientific reading complement and clarify each other.