The clinical estimation of suggestibility

Expectancies about the consequences of the suppression of behavior and about the effects of expressing emotions are proposed as sources of the “talking cure” which developed during Breuer's treatment of Anna o. and which later became known as the cathartic method. Although the argument is similar to one proposed by Ellenberger (1970, 1972) it sets out a more rational alternative to his explanation that the method was partly a creation of the mythopoetic unconscious. The analysis of the interaction between Breuer and Anna 0. makes explicit the expectancies underlying each of the steps through which the cathartic method developed and traces these expectancies to the general beliefs and the specific theoretical interests shared by them.