Arthur Janov, psychologist, was 93

Arthur Janov, the psychologist who created, practiced and preached primal therapy, a sensation of the 1970s in which patients were coached to let out sobs or screams as they relived childhood trauma in a quest to overcome neurosis, died Oct. 1 at his home in Malibu, Calif. He was 93.

The cause was respiratory arrest following a stroke, his wife, France Janov, told the Associated Press.

Through his treatment of celebrities — among them entertainers John Lennon, Yoko Ono and James Earl Jones — Janov became a celebrity in his own right beginning in the 1970s.

In a best-selling book, and in appearances on television programs such as “The Dick Cavett Show,” he converted curious onlookers to committed followers with an enticingly simple explanation of psychological ailments, and what he billed as a near surefire way of resolving them.

His debut book, “The Primal Scream,” was published in 1970 and sold more than 1 million copies. In that and subsequent volumes, he laid out his theory of Primal Pain, a term he rendered in capital letters.

If a baby suffers unduly during birth, or if his or her basic needs of food, warmth, love and stimulation are not met during infancy, that child may grow up and develop neuroses or other ills. They might include addiction, schizophrenia, sexual dysfunction, psoriasis, menstrual cramps and homosexuality, he wrote, despite the rapidly evolving understanding among doctors that homosexuality is not an illness.

To resolve Primal Pain, Janov invited patients to regress to childhood. His offices included cribs and toys. Patients were permitted or encouraged to suck their thumbs. Only once they have reached their former infant state might they access the Primal Pain that they had repressed.

His therapy became popularly known as “primal scream therapy” for the manner in which patients sometimes released that pain — through shouts such as “Daddy, be nice!” or “I hate you, I hate you!” Janov said his work was often misrepresented and reduced to screams, when in fact the release might instead take place through writhing or crying.

Reporting remarkable success rates, Janov declared his treatment “the most important discovery of the 20th century.” Jones, the actor, told Newsweek that primal therapy had resolved his hemorrhoids and helped him to stop smoking. The pianist Roger Williams said the therapy cured him of the problem of cold hands.