ABSTRACT
PDS had its origin in the fortuitous discovery that the perceptanalytic interpretive TAT rules (Piotrowski Psychoanal. Rev., 1950, 1952), appropriately modified, yield even more valid results when applied to manifest dreams (Piotrowski 1971, 1973). PDS gives a personality assessment, shows the intrapsychic incompatibilities, the affective and behavioral reactions to disturbing conflicts and frustrations, and reveals how the dreamer consciously or unconsciously envisages the resolution of his subjective difficulties. The basic postulate requires that dream events be evaluated as if they were events observed consciously in active life. However, the dream report (the dreamer’s description of his unconsciously produced and privately perceived visual-motor events) must first be translated, with the aid of PDS rules, into the standard conscious and universal verbal language. The most useful as well as reliable and valid PDS rules are Assent–Dissent and Primacy of Verbs and Abstract Nouns. Second in reliability and validity are the rules of Symbolism and Implied Evidence. Any suitable generalizations about human personality and its development, Freudian, Jungian, sociological, and so forth can be used to complement the PDS assessment (Rule of Complementarity). PDS employs two axioms, A and B, which differ in purpose, importance and validity of conclusions. The second part of this article contains a dream, a demonstration of its blind PDS interpretation (Z.A.P.) and psychotherapeutic notes relevant to the validation of the blind interpretation (A.M.B.).
