The Effects of Subliminal, Supraliminal and Vocalized Aggression on the Ego Functioning of Schizophrenics

An experimental technique for the study of unconscious conflict

“…Our assumption, as spelled out earlier, was that this was most apt to happen when the content of the stimulus bypasses awareness. We tested this assumption in two of the studies with schizophrenics (Silverman & Spiro, 1968;Silverman & Candell, 1970) and in two studies of non-schizophrenics (Silverman & Goldweber, 1966;. In all three we found that when the drive stimulus was presented supraliminally and in the subject's awareness, in contrast to what occurred after subliminal drive stimulation, there was no increase in the pathology under consideration.…”

“…In two of these studies (Silverman & Goldweber, 1966;Silverman & Spiro, 1968), there were a handful of subjects who gave evidence of blocking awareness of the supraliminally SILVERMAN appearing drive-related content. In both cases, as much pathology appeared for them after this supraliminal condition as appeared after the subliminal drive condition (which was not the case for the great majority of subjects who did not show this blocking tendency).…”

Subliminal Psychodynamic Activation: Methodological Problems and Questions in Silverman's Experiments

“…viewing distance used in the foregoing experiments of Silverman. Silverman and Spiro (1968) and Spiro and Silverman (1969) also presented A charging lion, teeth bared, was an a gressive stimulus One can only conjecture a%bi?t?i size of the lion stimulus. It seems un&y that an aggressive stimulus of 3.75 ~4 .…”

Subliminal Psychodynamic Activation: Mommy and I are Not Yet One

“…Silverman (1976) contended that the relevance of SPA findings in support of olstrapsychoanalytic theory does not require a demonstration of subliminal re,' tion in its strictist sense. H e claimed that the results of the discrimination task demonstrate such registration and, curiously, supported that contention by citing three papers, two of which were Silverman and Spiro (1967b) and Silverman ( 1968). Finally, Silverman and Weinberger ( 1985) held that the results of the discrimination task establish stimulus subliminality according to Eriksen's (1960) criterion that subjects are unable to differentiate or discriminate between experimental and control stimuli by a verbal report.…”