Psychoanalytic descriptions of conscious and unconscious mental processes are discussed in the light of the philosophical problems in this area. A definition of the unconscious as the unverbalizable is employed that enables it to be subjected to experimental study. Three methods of studying the unconscious are described and scrutinized: percept-genetics, the drive activation method, and the G analysis of projective tests. It is concluded that psychoanalytic notions of the unconscious are open to experimental analysis.
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