ABSTRACT
There has been a considerable body of work on verbal accessibility, as well as a substantial literature reporting work on closely related conceptions. In this chapter, the author synthesizes the theory surrounding the phenomenon labeled verbal accessibility (VA). In the psychoanalytic tradition, it may be regarded as within the realm of ego psychology. Practically all of Lewin's Field Theory deals with varied aspects of what in analytic circles is called ego psychology. The theorizing of Lev Semenovich Vygotsky, Hellmuth Kaiser, and David Rapaport offers persuasive support for the significance of VA. Rapaport's remarks are directed at the potentials for therapeutic work one might find from increasing the patient's VA. If VA is found correlated with a number of important variables about the personality, this is well worth knowing for diagnostic reasons. Measuring VA requires that the attitudes being verbalized be assigned weights.
