Josef Breuer

1842-1925

Josef Breuer, an Austrian doctor, was born January 15, 1842, in Vienna, where he died on June 20, 1925. Breuer, the son of a liberal Jewish professor of theology, studied medicine in Vienna and obtained his degree in 1864. He served as an assistant in internal medicine to Theodor Oppolzer, and worked on heat regulation and the physiology of respiration (Hering-Breuer reflex); upon becoming a practitioner in 1871, he set up his practice in Vienna. He also conducted research on the function of the inner ear (Mach-Breuer theory of the flow of endolymphatic fluid) and, although he became a specialist in internal medicine in 1874, he returned to his research in 1884.

He was the friend and family doctor of several members of the Vienna Teachers College and of Viennese high society. He maintained a correspondence with artists, writers, philosophers, psychologists, and colleagues in his field, and in 1894 was elected a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences. Well versed in philosophy, Breuer was interested in the theory of knowledge and the theoretical foundations of Darwinism (1902 conference, exchange of letters with Franz von Brentano). He was an active participant in discussions on the foundations of politics and ideology, and discussed issues of art, literature, and music. As an assimilated and enlightened Jew, he adopted a kind of pantheism that he derived from Goethe and Gustav Theodor Fechner. His favorite aphorism was Spinoza's suum esse conservare (preserve one's being). He was gripped by a form of skepticism and spoke, following William Thackeray, of his "demon 'but'," which forced him to question any newly acquired knowledge. Because of his detailed knowledge of the history of ideas and social history, his appreciation of the political conditions of his era, as well as for reasons having to do with his own life, he believed it was nearly impossible for him to undertake a questionable action.

Underlying Breuer's research on physiology was the quest for the relation between structure and function, and thus for a form of teleological query. He was particularly interested in regulatory processes in the form of self-control mechanisms. Unlike a number of physiologists in the so-called biophysicalist movement, inspired by Ernst Brücke, Hermann von Helmholtz, and Emil Du Bois-Reymond, Breuer believed in neovitalism.

In 1880-1882 Breuer treated a young patient, Bertha Pappenheim (Anna O.), for a nervous cough and a multitude of other hysterical symptoms (mood swings, alterations in states of consciousness, visual disturbances, paralysis and contractions, aphasia). During the many long interviews, doctor and patient saw that some symptoms disappeared when the memory of their first appearance returned and could be reproduced, and the associated affects could be awakened and abreacted. This occurred at specific times of day, during spontaneous auto-hypnotic states. Based on these observations, initially accidental, patient and doctor developed a systematic procedure whereby the individual symptoms were gradually recalled during their appearance in reverse chronological order, until they disappeared for good following a reproduction of the original scene. Sometimes artificial hypnosis was used during therapy if the patient was not in a state of auto-hypnosis. The patient, who at times "forgot" her native language and understood only English, jokingly referred to this therapy as the talking cure, or chimney sweeping.

During the therapy, a stay at a clinic near Vienna was required because of the patient's heightened risk of suicide. In spite of the apparent and surprising success of the method, certain manifestations remained. These included the temporary loss of her native language and violent neuralgia of the trigeminal nerve, which required morphine treatment, leading to addiction. Because of her symptoms Breuer had his patient admitted for further treatment to Dr. Ludwig Binswanger's Bellevue sanatorium in Kreuzlingen in July 1882. She left in October, improved but not fully cured (Histoire de la maladie, in Hirschmüller, A. 1978). She lived until 1888 in Vienna, was treated on several occasions, then moved to Frankfurt, where she had an active life as a writer, social worker, defender of women's rights, and a leader of the movement of Jewish women in Germany (Jensen, E. 1984; Tisseron, Y. 1986; Heubach, H. 1992).

In 1882 Breuer discussed the case with his colleague Sigmund Freud, fourteen years his junior. Freud tested Breuer's method on patients after he began working as a neurologist. Starting from the theories of Jean Martin Charcot, Pierre Janet, August Ferdinand Möbius, Hippolyte Bernheim, and others, they jointly developed a theoretical framework for the operation of the psychic apparatus and for their therapeutic procedure, which they called the "cathartic method" in reference to Aristotle's ideas about the function of tragedy (catharsis as the purification of the spectators' emotions). In 1893 they published a preliminary report entitled "On the Psychic Mechanisms of Hysterical Phenomena". This was followed two years later by the Studies on Hysteria, the "cornerstone of psychoanalysis" (Ilse Grubrich-Simitis), establishing the foundations of the field. There was a chapter on theory (Breuer), a chapter on therapy (Freud), and five case histories (Anna O., Emmy von N., Katharina, Lucy R., Elisabeth von R.).

Freud continued to develop the theory and technique as they developed the work jointly (defense neuroses, free association). Breuer was not convinced by the exclusive emphasis on sexual factors and Freud saw Breuer's caution as a sign of aloofness. In 1895 the distance between the two men increased, resulting in the end of their collaboration. Breuer continued to take an interest in the development of psychoanalytic theory but abandoned cathartic therapy. Freud later proposed the hypothesis that Anna O.'s treatment had been suddenly interrupted because of a violent erotic transference, accompanied by hysterical pregnancy and childbirth. This version of events, constructed retroactively by Freud and spread by Ernest Jones, among others, cannot withstand historical scrutiny. More recent attempts to show that the description of the case of Anna O. was a "fraud" (Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen) are a form of unsubstantiated polemic.

Bibliography

Breuer, Josef. (1986). Die krisis des Darwinismus und die teleologie. Vortrag, gehalten am 2.5.1902. Tübingen: Diskord.

Ebner-Eschenbach, Marie von; Breuer, Josef. (1969). Ein briefwechsel, 1889-1916. Vienna: Robert A. Kann.

Hirschmüller, Albrecht. (1978). Physiologie und psychoanalyse in leben und werk Josef Breuers. Bern-Stuttgart: Hans Huber.

Jensen, Ellen M. (1970). "Anna O: A study of her later life." The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 39, 269-93.

——. (1984). Streifzüge durch das leben von Anna O.-Bertha Pappenheim. Ein fall für die psychiatrie. Ein leben für die philanthropie. Dreieich.

Pappenheim, Bertha. (1992). Sisyphus. Gegen den Mädchen-handel Galizien: Bertha Pappenheim, die Anna O. In Helga Heubach (Ed.), Freiburg im Breisgau. Le Travail de Sisyphe. (1986). Paris: Des femmes-Antoinette Fouque.

—ALBRECHT HIRSCHMÜLLER

Josef Breuer

Full name	Josef Breuer
Born	15 January 1842(1842-01-15)
Died	20 June 1925 (aged 83)
School/tradition	Psychoanalysis
Influenced Sigmund Freud

Josef Breuer (January 15, 1842 – June 20, 1925) was an Austrian physician whose works lay the foundation of psychoanalysis.

Born in Vienna, his father, Leopold Breuer, taught religion in Vienna's Jewish community. Breuer's mother died when he was quite young, and he was raised by his maternal grandmother and educated by his father until the age of eight. He graduated from the Akademisches Gymnasium of Vienna in 1858 and then studied at the university for one year, before enrolling in the medical school of the University of Vienna. He passed his medical exams in 1867 and went to work as assistant to the internist Johann Oppolzer at the university.

Contents 1 Anna O. 2 Other work 3 Family 4 In fiction 5 Works 6 References

Anna O.

A close friend and collaborator with Sigmund Freud, Breuer is perhaps best known for his work with Anna O. (the pseudonym of Bertha Pappenheim), a woman suffering with symptoms of paralysis, anaesthesias, and "disturbances of vision and speech". (Zangwill^{[citation needed]})

Breuer observed that her symptoms were reduced or disappeared after she described them to him. Anna O. humorously called this procedure chimney sweeping. She also coined the more serious appellation for this form of therapy, the talking cure, which is widely regarded as the basis of Freudian psychoanalysis. (Peter Gay, Freud: A Life for Our Time, pp. 65–66)

Freud and Breuer documented their discussions of Anna O., along with other case studies, in their 1895 book, Studies on Hysteria. These discussion of Breuer's treatment of Anna O. became "a formative basis of Freudian theory and psychoanalytic practice; especially the importance of fantasies ..., hysteria ..., and the concept and method of catharsis which were Breuer's major contributions." (Zangwill^{[citation needed]})

Other work

Breuer, working under Ewald Hering at the military medical school in Vienna, was the first to demonstrate the role of the vagus nerve in the reflex nature of respiration. This was a departure from previous physiological understanding, and changed the way scientists viewed the relationship of the lungs to the nervous system. The mechanism is now known as the Hering-Breuer reflex.^[1]

Independent of each other^[2] in 1873, Breuer and the physicist and mathematician Ernst Mach discovered how the the sense of balance (i.e., the perception of the head’s imbalance) functions: that it is managed by information the brain receives from the movement of a fluid in the semicircular canals of the inner ear. That the sense of balance depends on the three semicircular canals was discovered in 1870 by the physiologist Friedrich Goltz, but Goltz did not discover how the balance-sensing apparatus functions.

In 1894, Breuer was elected a Corresponding Member of the Vienna Academy of Science. (Robert S. Steele, Freud and Jung p. 50)

Family

Breuer married Mathilde Altmann in 1868, and they had five children. His daughter Dora later committed suicide rather than be deported by the Nazis. Likewise, one of his granddaughters died at their hands.

In fiction

A series of meetings between Josef Breuer and Friedrich Nietzsche was fictionally created in the book When Nietzsche Wept by Irvin D. Yalom.

The 1968 TV film Prescription: Murder, which introduced the character of Columbo, begins with the murderer (Gene Barry), an arrogant psychiatrist, stumping party guests in a game of Botticelli by choosing Josef Breuer.

In 1992, the relationship between Josef Breuer and Anna O. was fictionalized in the play "The Mystery of Anna O". Spanning 3 time periods, the play questions whether Anna O was actually Bertha Pappenheim. The play was written by Jerome Coopersmith.

Works

• Zwei Fälle von Hydrophobie. In: Wiener medizinische Wochenschrift 18 (1868). Sp. 178 f., 210-213.
• Das Verhalten der Eigenwärme in Krankheiten. In: Wiener medizinische Wochenschrift 18 (1868). Sp. 982-985, 998-1002.
• Die Selbststeuerung der Athmung durch den Nervus vagus. In: Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften Wien, math.-naturw. Kl. 58/2 (1868), S. 909-937.
• Bemerkungen zu Senator's „Beiträge zur Lehre von der Eigenwärme und dem Fieber“. In: Arch. path. Anat., Berlin 46 (1969), S. 391 f.
• Über Bogengänge des Labyrinths. In: Allg. Wien. med. Ztg. 18 (1873), S. 598, 606.
• Über die Function der Bogengänge des Ohrlabyrinthes. In: Med. Jb., Wien 1874. S. 72-124.
• Zur Lehre vom statischen Sinne (Gleichgewichtsorgan). Vorläufige Mittheilung. In: Anz. Ges. Ärzte, Wien 1873. Nr. 9 (17. Dezember 1873), S. 31-33.
• Beiträge zur Lehre vom statischen Sinne (Gleichgewichtsorgan, Vestibularapparat des Ohrlabyrinths). Zweite Mittheilung. In: Med. Jb., Wien 1875. S. 87-156.
• Neue Versuche an den Ohrbogengängen. In: Arch. Physiol. 44 (1889), S. 135-152.
• Über die Funktion der Otolithen-Apparate. In: Arch. Physiol. 48 (1891), S. 195-306.
• Über Brommastitis. In: Wien. med. Presse 35 (1894), Sp. 1028.
• Über Bogengänge und Raumsinn. In: Arch. Physiol. 68 (1897), S. 596-648.
• Die Krisis des Darwinismus und die Teleologie. Vortrag, gehalten am 2. Mai 1902. In: Vorträge und Besprechungen. (1902), S. 43-64. Nachdruck der Ausgabe 1902: Edition diskord, Tübingen 1986.
• Über Galvanotropismus bei Fischen. In: Zbl. Physiol., Wien 16 (1902), S. 481-483.
• Studien über den Vestibularapparat. In: Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften Wien, math.-naturw. Kl. 112/3(1903), S. 315-394.
• Über den Galvanotropismus (Galvanotaxis) bei Fischen. In: Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften Wien, math.-naturw. Kl. 114/3 (1905), S. 27-56.
• Über das Gehörorgan der Vögel. In: Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften Wien, math.-naturw. Kl. 116/3 (1907), S. 249-292.
• Bemerkungen zu Dr. H. Abels Abhandlung „über Nachempfindungen im Gebiete des kinästhetischen und statischen Sinnes“. In: Zschr. Psychol. Physiol. Sinnesorg. 45 (1907), 1. Abt., S. 78-84.
• Über Ewald's Versuch mit dem pneumatischen Hammer (Bogengangsapparat). In: Zschr. Sinnesphysiol. 42 (1908), S. 373-378.
• Curriculum vitae [1923]. In: Dr. Josef Breuer 1842-1925. Wien o. J. [1927]. S. 9-24.
• Ein telepathisches Dokument. In: Umschau 28 (1924). S. 215 f.
• Josef Breuer / Rudolf Chrobak: Zur Lehre vom Wundfieber. Experimentelle Studie. In: Med. Jb., Wien 22/4 (1867). S. 3-12.
• Josef Breuer / Sigmund Freud: Über den psychischen Mechanismus hysterischer Phänomene. Vorläufige Mittheilung. In: Neurol. Zbl. 12 (1893), S. 4-10, 43-47; zugleich in: Wien. med. Blätter 16 (1893), S. 33-35, 49-51.
• Sigmund Freud / Josef Breuer: Studien über Hysterie. Franz Deuticke, Leipzig + Wien 1895. Neudruck: 6. Auflage. Fischer, Frankfurt a. M. 1991. ISBN 3596104467
• Josef Breuer / Alois Kreidl: Über die scheinbare Drehung des Gesichtsfeldes während der Einwirkung einer Centrifugalkraft. In: Arch. Physiol. 70 (1898), S. 494-510.
• Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach / Josef Breuer: Ein Briefwechsel. 1889-1916. Bergland-Verlag, Wien 1969

References

1. ^ Breuer, Josef (1842-1925) | Encyclopedia of Psychology | Find Articles at BNET at www.findarticles.com
2. ^ Hawkins, J.E. and Schacht, J. "The Emergence of Vestibular Science" (Part 8 of "Sketches of Otohistory") in "Audiology and Neurotology," April 2005.

• Cranefield, Paul F. "Breuer, Josef." In the Dictionary of Scientific Biography , edited by Charles Coulston Gillispie, vol. 2. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1981, ISBN 0-684-80588-X
• Hirschmüller, Albrecht. The Life and Work of Josef Breuer: Physiology and Psychoanalysis. New York: New York University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-8147-3427-8
• Zangwill, O.L. "Breuer, Joseph." In The Oxford Companion to the Mind New York: Oxford University Press, 1998 ISBN 0-19-860224-3
• Gale Encyclopedia of Psychology.

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