Touch Papers: Dialogues on Touch in the Psychoanalytic Space

Out of all medical and therapeutic treatments, psychoanalysis remains one of the very few that uses no physical contact. Sigmund Freud stopped using the "pressure technique" in the late 1890s, a technique in which he would press lightly on his patient's head while insisting that they remember forgotten events. Today, touch remains virtually non-existent in adult psychoanalysis.

For the first time, this book explores the controversial issue of physical contact in the consulting room. The…