Biography of Josef Breuer (1842-1925)

Josef Breuer was a renowned doctor, psychiatrist and physiologist of Austrian origin. According to some writers, your full name is Josef Robert Breuer.

Content

• Josef Breuer's first years
• Medical contributions
• Breuer and Psychology
• Origin of Breuer's psychological theory and psychoanalysis
• Conclusion
  • Bibliography

Josef Breuer's first years

Josef Breuer was born on January 15, 1842 in Vienna, Austria, within a rich Jewish family. When his mother died in 1846, little Josef is careful of his grandmother and his father. Although he was always clinging to Judaism and his fundamental principles, he never practiced such religion and was a great defender of differential principles. He began his medicine career in 1859 when he was 17 years old. He was a student of prominent doctors and even became the assistant of one in the Great General Hospital of Vienna.

Medical contributions

In 1868 he worked with the DR. Ewald Hering in his physiology laboratory, where he manages to determine the relationship through the lungs and the nervous system, that is, who discovered the regulation of body temperature through breathing. It was in that year when he also married Mathilde Altmann, with whom he would later have a total of 5 children.

A few years later, Josef Breuer ends his career at the university and begins to serve patients privately. In 1873, and working from a laboratory at home with a colleague, he manages discover the relationship between ear and balance. In addition to providing services as a doctor and devoting themselves to investigating, Josef Breuer also taught at the Institute of Physiology of the University of Vienna, where he renounces in 1885. On one occasion, while dictating a course in the place in 1877, he met Sigmund Freud with whom he filed a great relationship.

Breuer and Psychology

Breuer was always a great advisor to Freud while he was in his career. His first incursions into the treatment of hysteria date back to 1880, when he treated a patient inducing her in a hypnotic state. It was from then on, and through future investigations, when Josef Breuer established what would be the basis of psychoanalysis that his colleague.

The creator is considered at the level of psychology, of the cathartic method, from which the psychic pathologies of hysteria can be treated. It was the cathartic method on what Sigmund Freud was based to create psychoanalysis later. At a medical and physiological level, he discovered that the ear works as a regulator of our balance and also saw that body thermal regulation is done by breathing.

Origin of Breuer's psychological theory and psychoanalysis

The concept of Breuer's psychological theory dates back to the summer of 1880 and the treatment of Bertha Pappenheim, known under the pseudonym of Anna or. In his informative article, a seriously disturbed 21 -year -old woman who showed a series of hysterical symptoms. When treating her, Breuer invented her cathartic or conversion therapy. Freud was so fascinated with this case that he followed him for many years, and later began using this "cathartic treatment" under the guidance of Breuer. Breuer's treatment to Anna or. It was the first modern example of Deep psychotherapy for a long time.

In 1893, Breuer and Freud summarized their joint explorations in this form of psychotherapy in Studien über Hysterie. However, In 1896 Breuer and Freud separated and never spoke again. This seems to have been caused by disagreement on the issue of the truth of the early childhood memories that patients explained. However, despite the differences between the two men, their families remained in close contact.

Breuer was a man of broad cultural interests, friendly with many of the brightest intellects of his time. In addition to his activity as a physiologist and psychiatrist, Breuer also worried intensely about philosophy and a theoretical basis for Darwinism. His motto was the "Suum Esse conserve" of Spinoza: preservation of oneself and nature.

Conclusion

Breuer was considered One of Vienna's best doctors and scientists. He was chosen a member of the Academy of Sciences of Vienna in 1894 after the nomination of three of its most distinguished members: the physicist Ernst Mach and the physiologists Ewald Hering and Sigmund Exner. In 1894 he was appointed corresponding member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Breuer's life is the fictitious basis of the best -selling novel "und Nietzsche Weinte" by Irvin Yalom. Josef Breuer died in Vienna in 1925.

What is hypnotherapy and how it works

Bibliography

• Breuer, j. (1895). Studies on hysteria. Editorial Alliance.
• Breuer, j. (1922). Healing by the Spirit. Morata editions.
• Freud, s., & Breuer, J. (1893-1895). Hysteria case, of which the "conversion" and its psychological value have been made. Complete works by Sigmund Freud. Volume I. Amorrortu Editores.
• Ellenberger, h. F. (1971). The Discovery of the Unconscious: The History and Evolution of Dynamic Psychiatry. Basic Books.
• Schimelpfening, n. (2019). Josef Breuer: Biography and Contributions. Varywell Mind.
• Sechrest, l. (1992). Josef Breuer's Contributions to The Origins of Psychoanalytic Theory. American Journal of Psychiatry, 149 (9), 1180-1188.