Dr. Mark Solms - Understanding Consciousness to Optimize Therapeutic Outcomes

Thoughts on Record: Podcast of the Ottawa Institute of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy

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CBT interventions are often favoured for being empirically supported; however, it is not always clear how efficacy of these interventions maps to the actual functioning of the brain. Esteemed neuropsychologist and psychoanalyst, Dr. Mark Solms, joins us for an in-depth discussion of the clinical implications of his research into the biological underpinnings of consciousness as discussed in in his wonderful book, The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness. In this discussion we cover :

• why Dr. Solms gravitated towards a psychoanalytic framework to explore the underlying neuroscience of brain function
• the definition of consciousness that Dr. Solms employs when considering matters related to consciousness
• the brain's "workflow" with respect to constructing conscious experience
• how the brain weighs the importance of various competing needs
• the unexpected role of the brain stem and cortex in consciousness
• levering critical implications of this model of information processing to enhance standard CBT interventions
• consideration of therapeutic potential of the therapeutic alliance through the lens of Dr. Solm's system of consciousness
• what his model can teach us about the origins of psychopathology and challenges with personality
• leveraging the content of our dreams knowing their biological basis (Dr. Solms elucidated the specific neurobiological origins of dreaming, beyond REM sleep)

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Mark Solms, PhD, is Director of Neuropsychology at the University of Cape Town. He is Director of Training of the South African Psychoanalytical Association, Member of the British Psychoanalytical Society and Honorary Member of the New York Psychoanalytic Society. He is Director of the Science Department of the American Psychoanalytic Association and Co-Chair of the International Neuropsychoanalysis Society. He was Research Chair of the International Psychoanalytical Association. He was awarded the Sigourney Prize in 2012. He has published more than 350 papers in both neuroscientific and psychoanalytic journals, and six books, including The Brain and the Inner World (2002), which was a bestseller translated into 12 languages and his latest book The Hidden Spring. His selected writings were published as The Feeling Brain (2015). He is the editor of the Revised Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud (24 volumes) and the Complete Neuroscientific Works of Sigmund Freud (four volumes).