The theories about unconscious processes and repression were worked out in connection with hysteria. Psychological processes become or remain unconscious as a result of interpersonal situations. S. Freud discovered the existence of repression, the ability to put unbearable memories out of the conscious mind, and he established abreaction through free association as a means of undoing the process of repression. Freud found that something similar happened in obsessional neurosis and phobias and that probably also psychosis was produced by a comparable method. The purpose of repression as first understood was the avoidance of pain. Freud, during the 1880's, became a pupil of J. Breuer and together they made further observations. A hysterical symptom represents a forgotten memory or condensation of several. Breuer and Freud each had a different theory as to what produced the forgetting. Breuer's theory was that certain conditions favoured dissociation.