EPA-1707 – From delusional perception to annulment drive (1962–1971)

In 1962 ‘Some notes on paranoidal and schizophrenic delusional perception’ by the Italian psychiatrist Fagioli has been published. After having left the Psychiatric Hospital in Venice and a neurobiological approach, Fagioli studied clinical phenomenology in Padua. He was inclined to criticize the neurological pathogenesis in Psychiatry. His approach made him introducing in the Schneider's delusional perception a study that focused on a delusional meaning attribution as simultaneous to the act of a normal perceiving. The simultaneity of both perception and meaning attribution has been remarked as reaction to an environmental stimulus, but, differently from classical psychopathology, in this reaction the perception is not altered, while the thought is. Moreover, we have to observe that thought is connected to reality and to the affective state. This theoretical position could be distinguished from the classical psychopathological vision, that considers the delusional perception such as an alteration of perception, like can be observed in neurological damage, or considers the perception as normal but not understandable (‘ohne Anlass’). The idea of a thought reaction determined a view to a second level of thought, beyond the consciousness. So that in 1971 Fagioli formulated the annulment drive (‘pulsione di annullamento’), a psychic reaction to a disappointing stimulus from the human affective environment. Since this mechanism, a psychopathological process can originate. In our opinion, the ‘pulsione di annullamento’, being an immediate and non-conscious activity toward the human reality out of the subject, goes into delusional perception concept of simultaneity in more depth.