Drive Positions. (Positions pulsionnelles)
By Karl Louvet.

(Translation 07 03 06 by Leo ‘Berlips. Ed: www.szondiforum.org)

Introduction:
The following is a translation of an article by Louvet in which he describes how the Drive Circuit theory with success can be used for a more detailed and deeper interpretation of individual factors, depending on their rank inside of their vector. Louvet succeeded even to use this approach to explain the interrelationship inside some of the ambivalent factors. He demonstrates this by a “step by step” analysis of the (k+) and (k-) dynamics, inside of the (k ±). This is also true for his example of the (m ±) reaction and other factor positions.

Characteristic for Karl is that he illustrates his conclusions with concrete examples in a very picturesque way. As a former test psychologist, who in the sixties and seventies often had to interpret test material of people living in other parts of Sweden by blind diagnostic, I really enjoyed myself to read Louvet's subtle interpretations.

I think that e.g. his example of “obsession” mentioned in this article with success can be used in teaching of how to use the Szondi test.

As usual this translation is also done in a very liberal manner. As it was a difficult text I sometimes had to take the freedom to make some rather subjective interpretations. These are pointed out by the symbols: /…./

I must therefore take the responsibility entirely for all that which is not quite correct. I count however with your tolerance since I am no professional translator.
Leo Berlips, editor  www.szondiforum.org

Content:

(k ±)	page 2
(m±)	6
(h± s±)	13
(k± p+) and (k± p)	13
d+ m+	15

Instinctual position (k ±) by Karl Louvet.

The factor (k) and the shaping of the sensoric aspect.
It seemed possible to me to approach the factor (k) more specifically, according to its sensoric function (mise en forme sensorielle), depending on if it is used in the service of the person, as shown in (k+), or when used in the service of  the group in the form (k-).
Generally  mainly creative persons give us the possibility to understand more easily the application of the formal rules for personal use as shown by (k+). In contrast to them our education influences us strongly to use this sensoric function (k-) in the use of a group and its standards: “One does not say these things in the home of the Jones”…, Behave correctly, … You  have not yet the age to look at this TV program… ”.

In (k+), reality is the object of the sensoric form as shaped by the person (); that means that it is based on his  own experience and according to his ideas. Instead in (k-) it is rather the person who is the object of a reality to which he must adept.   In (k+), the person explores reality /with the intention/ to shape a personal setting in the  world which surrounds him and which is made specific to his way of seeing, his  customs etc. He creates, adapts and transforms to reproduce a reality according to his needs.

Instead in (k-) it is mainly the person who is the object of the reality to which he has to conform. In (k+) the person explores reality in order to collect his own equipment from the world that is around him, and that corresponds to his way of seeing, to his taste, and his habits. He creates, adapts and transforms in order to shape a reality according to his needs.

 In (k-) it concerns the strict adaptation to reality. This adaptation is done because the subject subordinates his own experience and dedicates the use of his interests to the interests of community. He “withdraws” his libido away from his own way of looking at the world in order to strengthen the community’s way of interpreting. It is characteristic of that which one calls sense of reality.

In short: in (k+), it is the person´s experience that gets priority, whereas in (k-) it is the experience of the group that prevails.

Method Mathieu 22, 21 explores the possibilities of the way the factors overlap, seen from the perspective of the logical /developmental/ hierarchy of the circuit. Thus, according to this reasoning, what happens in (k-) is that one has made one developmental step more in relation to the (k+).
/From level 1= (p-) to 2= (k+) to 3= (k-) to 4= ( p+) / In other words, the way of action of the (k+) is encapsulated in the access to the activities on the level of (k-). Indeed, the higher logical level, as shown by (k-) dictates thus the final outcome of the (k±): the conformity to reality. But with (k±), this passes through the (k+). What will this has for consequences?

In (k±), the subject decides what is reality according to his personal experience. He knows reality better than the others.
It is typically for what we call a “professional deformation”: The subject has a personal experience (k+) that gives him the impression that he knows better than the others how to guarantee the concordance with reality.

/Example/:
Let us see the case of the hooligan and the police officer. The hooligan Roger is a small scale robber. He is accustomed to deceive, to make shadowy deals. His rules are those of his daily life, of his environment in which he evolved for good or worse. He made his own experience and earned not badly money lately. Thus, he bought a superb motor bike, powerful, exactly as he wanted, not as the scrap which he used lately. He is proud and he is very happy. It is parked in front of the house where he lives as he does not have a garage and his apartment is located at the side of the garden. After he brought back his motor bike, he is despairingly anxious; he will look constantly out of the window of the corridor which is next to the street. Just to see whether all is well. He has a good and trained  imagination. He knows all the tricks to steal a motor bike like his, rapid and effective. These are the tricks of the pros who pass through his head. He knows also the district. In short he will see for the tenth time his beautiful motor bike, as soon as he hears an engine which makes an abnormal noise. As soon as it started to get dark, even if only half an hour has gone since he was there. … In short, Roger has got an “obsession” in relation to his motor bike. He “knows very well” what is the reality of the street, one can in vain tell him to remain quiet, he laughs, “if you only did know how things happen”… His experience mediates the access to reality because he thinks that his experience is more adequate than that of common sense to supervise his motorized machine Phallus. The common sense in him does not have the force to castrate (limit) the experience of Roger. His vision of things is stronger even if he knows that everyone is not a thief like him, but that is not enough, he must check to be sure. This motor bike is too important, it is a narcissistic object, central for his personal image.  His obsession translates it into an “one way and return” ticket between the validation of reality and its mediatization by the intimate experience of the subject. It is the checking function of the (k±) which oscillates in a loop between the attraction of the narcissistic object and the risk to lose it.

In short the (k±) will intervene each time when a person  “knows better” than the other what reality is, in other words when the question of the veracity of reality is at stake in connection with something of importance in the eyes of this person. For them, it is not a question “to image personal ideas” in their head, they will undoubtedly say to you that their perspicacity is connected to the maximum with their capacity on this question of truth.

If we must refer to an anguish, it would be the fear of losing something of importance, something that one estimates and until now is in our possession or in our range.  In fact, as soon as the experience of the person appears more convincing to him than that of common sense he will engage the function of checking  (k±), “to be sure” until the end, to be right more than the others. If the reason for this reaction is a “precious object”, highly valuated in the narcissistic economy of the subject, then appears a stubbornness ensured against all blows. In order that the person avoids entering this torment of /at all times/ tormenting himself,  by checking reality according to his own experience, he needs a well founded and stable (k-). A (k-) that imposes the idea to the person that people are not like him and that his vision of the environment is deformed by a way of giving too much attention to /specific/ objects with the risk to become stupid about them.

Therefore, the torment with (k±) is caused either because the (k-) is unstable, or because the cause is really invaluable as seen with the eyes of the person who will prefer to check three times rather than one; or the two characteristics at the same time.

To consider the tri-tendancies with the (k±)

Two possibilities: (k± p+) and (k± p-).

With (k± p+): the influence of the (p+) dominates the others because it is the highest in the hierarchy of the circuit. The (p+) represents value systems which takes up /register/ the subject in a historical temporal continuity and the combination with (k±) is in the service of this Cause, by holding strict account that (k-) does not have any more precedence over the (k+) since the absolute power is moved onto the (p+) thus removing from the (k-) its possibility to frame the (k+). We thus have (k+) and (k-) in their original form  (condition objectale) as support or mediator in the service of the (p+):

The actual (object) condition of the (k+): is the outcome of the subject´s experience and a reflection of the support for the (p+) project. It is something like a personal equipment / luggage that distinguishes itself from the common collective thought, by following our specific sensory working through of our personal vision of the World. In other words one does not see all the same object at the same time, even if we are in the presence of another person.
This difference is the result of a very personal mnemic-trace, the result of the selected sensory interpretation of the “environment” (I do not employ the word “reality” to mark a difference with the common sense.). The (k+) is the guarantee for the existence and maintenance of this mnemic-trace. The actual quality (object condition) of the (k+) means here the experience of the subject in the service of the (p+), neither more nor less than the share of (k-).
In the absence of (k+p0), it can neither be question of an Almighty narcissism.

Two types of formatting.

The Ego has as a function to shape (design) the libido, it inserts it in a formal process, it holds it in a form and takes form while crossing the Ego. This creates initially a specific form that is reflecting itself, the result work of ipseity, the logic of a homogenèse. After this the libido can be formatted well beyond the Ego that becomes /then/ a servant in stakes higher than its ipseity. In this process of formatting, it seemed to me sensible, based on my experience with creative persons, to specify that there are two types of formatting:

The factor (k) deals with the sensory aspect, while the factor (p) deals with representations, not forgetting that the sensory aspects make the support for the representational and vice versa: The formatting of the factor (k) is a sensoric formatting: The Ego organizes its perception according to a grid of personal interpretation. It makes its own language, its threshold of pain and of resistance, its appetites, etc. When (k-) appears, a sensory formatting takes place in the service of the group. It is typically the case of the military service: one has to to change one´s own speech, one´s pain threshold, to modulate one´s appetites, etc.
The factor (k) is thus proposed here as a way to modify our sensations either as private (k+) or collective (k-) perception.

The formatting of the (p) factor concerns the representations. Once the grid of sensory interpretation of the subject is established in the factor (k), the factor (p) comes to modulate the associations of ideas and images resulting from this grid of interpretation and formats a representation either for private (p+) or collective (p-) use.

/Example/
Eve in paradise
To give an evaluation of the passage of (p-) towards the (k+), let us turn towards the original sin. When Eve is confronted with the desire of absolute power suggested by the Snake, we are in the presence of the birth of a personal outlook which breaks the filiation with the system. God said that one ought not to touch the tree which belongs to the paradise environment: One may look at this tree from the right-hand side, from the left side, from the bottom to top but, don’t touch! The filiation is at this price: notwithstanding the way in which you look (carry your glance), she will not have “to account for that.” in order to preserve the absolute power established at the origin. Any personal way of looking (glance) at will not be blamed. When Eve decides to transgress, she does so by using a personal sensory form which from now on will decide the  judgment of good and evil. The absolute power is subordinated  under the sensoriality of Eve, in the way how she uses her senses  (her vision of the paradise) and how she decides by herself and in herself her own destination system /values/: at the price of the judgment of the good and evil. It breaks with the destination implanted in the original system, the word of God.
“The woman thus considered that the fruit of this tree was good to be eaten; that it was  beautiful and pleasant to see.” (The Holy Bible, Lemaistre De Sacy, page 3, 3-6, volume I).

Instead of being an objectal support for a filiation (p-), her sensoric formatting henceforth becomes the true subject of a filiation with her self (k+): it is a judgment of good and evil starting from her own sensory condition.  She made a con-sideration, that struck the continuity system and diverted it from its first involvement by turning  the whole system towards a new original focus.

The absolute power /as represented by (p+)/ realises this consideration because the absolute power is a principle of the destination in itself. It is always a consideration which results from the stop of the universal flow: a fascination, a passion, a catatonia, a perverse scenario, a nonhistorical static temporality. All the weight of the filiation´s legality with a system will rest from now on the sensoric formatting specific to the person. This absolute power in the sensoric formatting engages a new way of looking with a new value.
“At the same time their eyes were opened to both of them” (the Holy Bible, Lemaistre De Sacy, page 3, 3-7, volume I)

A new way of looking, a new legitimacy, another filiation. In other words the “(k+) person” depends from now on his own vision of the world to legitimate herself and of nothing else. The grid of sensoric interpretation of the “(k+) person” is necessarily a foundation for his legitimacy. He is obliged to see the environment in his way, he does not have any more the choice, if not it is the Fall.
That explains the perverse tenacity to cling to one´s vision of things: the sensoric is the basic lever of the subjective quality whereas for a (p -) person, it is the last of its concerns.

Thus the common sense of (k-) is a way of seeing, hearing, of feeling one´s body, of feeding one self,… according to a strictly normative use defined by the environment,  while the factor (p-) indicates the luggage of the collective representations. For example, the fact of liking and of choosing the red color for one´s mourning dress could be of the (k+) type because it is the color of blood - that of the fundamental bond, because  it is as such the subject sees the world “with his heart”. But with (k-) one does not put on such conspicuous colours and one chooses dark tones like “conventional”  black or blue marinades, for a burial.
Another example, if a subject seriously can consider his whole life as the design of a water engine in (p+), in (p-) everyone will be able to say to you that such water engines do not exist.

Within the framework of the (k± p-), it is the factor (k-) which carries out the dance by imposing the common standards of reality sense (cf. the parameter “Popular or V” in the test of Rorschach).  Depending on the adequacy that support this checking, two possibilities are offered to the subject: the (k+) and (p-). The choice of these factors /in this constelleation/ translates the approval of the subject for (k+) and (p-) without one dominating over the other. All will depend on the reason for the checking (k-) according to the considered perspectives  of (k+ and/or p-).

/Example/
For example, there has been a time one time ago when the majority of people considered that the place of a woman was at home in the kitchen as a family mother. Imagine two theoretical possibilities for a woman of this time who wonders about her female condition by making (k± p-):
If the personal experience of the (k+) confirms the collective (p-) opinion, the result of the (k± p-) is that the adequate place of a woman at that time is to be a mother in the kitchen, that is “her reality”. /(k+) supports the action of (p-)/

If her (k+) denies the common opinion and asserts a quite other personal experience that has nothing to do with the primacy of the statute of the housewife, she is stuck  between two fires: