EUPHORIA

EUPHORIA (from the Greek eu- well and phero- I feel), an unfounded, elevated, joyful mood. Bleuler distinguishes two main types of E.: simple, which expresses itself in the passive experience of pleasure, and manic, or exaltation, accompanied by increased activity, heightened ambitions and aspirations, a flood of thoughts, and an increased sense of self-importance. Simple E. is most often found in progressive paralytics: patients feel unfoundedly happy, all their sensations are permeated with a feeling of pleasure, and the content of their thoughts is clearly built on the basis of this feeling (delusions of grandeur); at the same time, deprivation of freedom, insults, an unattractive external environment, insufficient and tasteless food, etc., if they do remove patients from this blissful state, do so only for very short periods. With the development of dementia, this feeling of infinite pleasure gradually becomes flatter and poorer in nuances, transforming into a contentless, meaningless, and dull satisfaction, similar to the state in some forms of far-advanced senile dementia. Mild degrees of simple E. are also found in some healthy people, for example, good-natured individuals inclined to enjoy life, calm optimists, the so-called 'sunny' natures. Patients in a state of exaltation rarely maintain a steady euphoric mood: the elevated self-feeling and ambitions of patients easily lead to conflicts and states of angry excitement, accompanied by a mood distinctly colored by displeasure (dysphoria), however, as Bleuler notes, the range of possible mood changes in these cases is basically kept close to the euphoric basis. Intermediate positions between simple and manic E. are occupied by changes in self-feeling caused by acute poisoning by alcohol, morphine, cocaine, hashish, etc. Kraepelin considers the cause of the experience of pleasure in these cases the elimination of inhibitions and the facilitated transition of impulses into actions, which gives a feeling of increased strength and animation. A separate group of E. consists of ecstatic states observed in epileptic changes in consciousness, schizophrenic experiences of boundless happiness associated with the feeling of a miraculous change in one's own existence and surrounding reality, and occasionally in some psychogenic reactions (hysterical ecstasy). In schizophrenia, states of objectless, foolish merriment without a bright affective coloring (in hebephrenics) and wild, boisterous merriment (in excited catatonics) are also observed, but the basis of these does not lie in true euphoria.

P. Zinoviev.

EUPHORIA (from the Greek ek- out and phero- I carry), the reproduction of an engram, i.e., a trace left in living matter by some impression. In a broad sense of the word, the term 'ecphoria' by supporters of Semon (see Semon's theory) is applied to all biological processes where there is a renewal of a state that has previously occurred in this material substrate (for example, in the brain). In a narrower sense, it is used by psychologists of the associationalist direction (for example, Bleuler) to denote the reproduction of once imprinted images in memory and movements consolidated through exercise in relation to motor habits. The mechanism of E. is set in motion by the associative process, and E. itself may remain unconscious; often, for example, various learned movements are not accompanied by awareness if they occur in a well-established order (small movements entering the process of dressing, the sequence of movements in swimming, riding a bicycle, driving a car, habitual gestures, facial expressions, etc.). In case of change in the engram itself, for example, due to the superimposition of new engrams on it associatively or its destruction by a pathological process in the brain, E. is also disrupted: it may occur in a modified form or may not be called forth at all. But even a preserved engram is not ecphorized under all circumstances: the trace left by the impression may prove too weak, and the associative push insufficient to develop the energy necessary for E. Disorders of E. are particularly frequent in the group of so-called organic psychoses in the narrow sense and in epilepsy.