L’attrition de l’espace de représentation dans les syndromes traumatiques

Traumatic syndroms raise several questions: delay of onset, repetition and extension of symptoms, characteristics of the traumatic scene. These questions cannot be solved by existing models without a conceptual framework to analyze interactions between memory and the traumatic scene. However, such a framework can be outlined within the recent theory of representation. A subjective universe is considered as a representational space displayed from memory. In traumatic syndromes, a deathly scene cannot be integrated within the representational space, breaking a basic principle of unification. An attrition process can be described: the deathly scene is settled in the center of the representational space and hit foundations in an insolvable way. Subjective vulnerability to trauma can also be analyzed within this conceptual framework.