The Bioelectrical Investigation of Sexuality and Anxiety

by Wilhelm Reich

Overview

The Bioelectrical Investigation of Sexuality and Anxiety is composed of three essential contributions from this period: "The Orgasm as an Electrophysiological Discharge," "Sexuality and Anxiety," and "The Bioelectrical Function of Sexuality and Anxiety." Reich's detailed report on the physiological experiments undertaken in Norway in 1935-36 in which he sought proof for his orgasm theory. They were compiled by Reich in 1945 and are presented here for the first time with his notes and corrections.

The Bioelectrical Investigation of Sexuality and Anxiety "can with good reason be understood as a logical continuation of Character Analysis," Reich wrote in the Foreword. "It is the character analysis of the areas of biological functioning." Today, when emotions are viewed as psychological-that is, non-physical-phenomena, Reich's clinical and experimental investigation of human sexuality gives revolutionary insight into the basically physical nature of emotional life."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781952000270
Publisher:	WRM PRESS
Publication date:	12/06/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	180
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Wilhelm Reich, a native of Austria, was born in 1897. His many works include Listen, Little Man!, Character Analysis, and The Mass Psychology of Fascism. He died in 1957.

Table of Contents

	Foreword	xi
1.	The Orgasm as an Electrophysiological Discharge	3
	Some peculiar features of sexuality	4
	The orgasm formula: mechanical tension [right arrow] bioelectrical charge [right arrow] bioelectrical discharge [right arrow] mechanical relaxation	9
2.	Sexuality and Anxiety	21
	Starting point and fundamental ideas	21
	Sexual excitation and anxiety affect	25
	Tendency to assume spherical form	40
	The primary vegetative form of the antithesis between sexuality and anxiety	41
	Kraus's "fluid theory of life"	48
	Potassium and calcium ions and the vegetative function	56
	The antithesis of center and periphery	62
3.	The Bioelectrical Function of Sexuality and Anxiety	71
	Basic summary of the clinical approach	71
	Observations on the oscillograph	77
	Anxiety and unpleasure	94
	More evidence of the basic antithesis of vegetative life	100
	Prerequisites for the pleasure reaction	105
	Electrical excitation in kissing	107
	Results of the control experiments	113
	The "vegetative center"	119
	Some theoretical conclusions	126
	Electrophotographic Data	131