The paternal and maternal symbolic dimensions in parental images of psychosomatic patients
The Semantic Differential Parental (S.D.P.), a modification of the Semantic Differential, has been developed from the assumption that it is possible to define, in a given culture, a paternal and a maternal series of qualities. These are considered as symbolic dimensions or 'gestalts' which find their origin in the specific signification the parents embody for the child, enriched by cultural characteristics. In this study the S.D.P. has been used to elicit how the paternal and maternal symbolic dimensions intervene in the image formation of parental images on both a realistic and 'ideal' parent or wish-fulfilment level. The problem has been tackled from two sides. The first question concerns the construction of the different parental images with regard to the absolute and relative contribution of the paternal and maternal symbolic dimensions as well as the rank order of attributing the separate qualities. In the second place the question arises in how far the paternal and maternal symbolic dimensions are experienced as separate entities in the process of image formation. The data are compared for a group of 113 psychosomatic patients and a control group of 107 healthy subjects. The results show that in the psychosomatic patients group the differentiation of paternal and maternal symbolic dimensions is less pronounced. Moreover they present a tendency to attribute maternal characteristics in such a way to the real mother and the ideal father that these images become more similar to the ideal mother image. These findings could reflect a deficiency of symbol and affect differentiation in the interaction processen of the first childhood.