Note
15:
All kinds of psychosis, not only schizophrenia, involve a breakdown of
the I-dynamism, with loss (more or less) of the distinction between Self
and World and a loss of insight.
In nonschizophrenic psychoses the tendency
to empathic identification and self-reflection is present to heal the mind
whenever the influence causing mental disorder abates.
Schizophrenia, by
contrast, in our view, is characterized by a defense against that very tendency.
In schizophrenia the mind turns against its potential for relatedness; it fights
its top integrating function, the I(nner You).
That may explain why the
prognosis in schizophrenia is, in general, worse than in other kinds of
functional psychosis.
However, any psychosis may lead to such a loss of faith
and trust that the person resorts to the schizophrenic defense. Then the vicious
circle and the diagnosis of schizophrenia take over.