Brain, Cognition, and Psychoanalysis: A Scoping Review
Anna Rita Giovagnoli, Panayiotis Patrikelis, Annalisa Parente, Alessandra Parisi, Rute Flavia Meneses

TL;DR
This review explores how psychoanalytic psychotherapy affects brain function and cognition, finding some evidence of positive changes in cognitive abilities and brain connectivity.
Contribution
The study provides a comprehensive scoping review of empirical research on brain and cognitive changes after psychoanalytic psychotherapy.
Findings
Five studies showed stable abstraction and mentalization after individual psychoanalytic therapy.
Group psychoanalytic therapy improved executive functions, emotional intelligence, and memory.
Twelve studies found functional brain changes using neuroimaging techniques after different types of psychoanalytic therapy.
Abstract
Background: Cognitive functions and brain connectivity could be influenced by psychoanalytic psychotherapy (PP), thus representing neurobiological parameters for therapy-induced changes. This study searched empirical studies on cognition and the brain to evaluate which functions have been assessed, with which instruments, and what changes have been documented in brain connectivity after PP. Methods: We used the guidelines and checklist of the Preferred Reporting Items of Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews. The literature search was performed on the Medline–PubMed, American Psychological Association-PsycINFO, Elton Bryson Stephens Company, and Cochrane databases, and Google Scholar, including articles on patients with non-psychotic disturbances published from 1980 to September 2024. Results: Fifty-nine articles were collected. Five articles reported on…
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Taxonomy
TopicsFunctional Brain Connectivity Studies · Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments · Mental Health Research Topics
