INDUCED FREUDIAN SLIPS AND COMPULSIVE CON FLICT

This study proceeds from Motley's experiments (1980) which attempted, by means of induced slips of the tongue, to test hypotheses derived fr om psychoanalysis. Grunbaum (1988) discussed and criticised these expe riments in detail. His claim that Motley failed to demonstrate the inf luence of unconscious thoughts on slips, led us in this inquiry to com pare the frequency of slips among compulsive neurotic and normal subje cts, because according to the psychoanalytic theory compulsive neurosi s is based on an unconscious conflict which necessarily leads to an in creased incidence of slips when conflict-relevant material is to be sp oken. Special attention was paid to the analysis of what we call non-s pecific slips which correspond most closely to the compromise-characte r of Freudian errors. By measuring the latencies of correctly spoken w ords we also examined whether the compulsive neurotic subjects make mo re latent errors than normal ones. All results confirmed our expectati ons: Compulsive neurotics in general produce more slips in the area of conflict-relevant words than normal subjects. This difference is mani fested in the incidence of non-specific slips and the latencies of cor rectly spoken words as well. Furthermore we found that persons prone t o compulsive actions display more slips and longer latencies of correc tly spoken conflict-relevant words than persons only prone to compulsi ve thoughts.