Skip to content

Psychoanalytic and reaction transfer

The popular concept of transfer defines it as the action of moving something or someone from one place or position to another. In psychology this definition is applied to refer to the feelings and emotions that are transferred from one person to another. The psychoanalytic transfer process describes a situation where the feelings, desires and expectations of one individual are redirected and applied to another – the idealized subject.

Psychoanalytic transfer

Psychoanalytic transference refers mainly to a therapeutic environment, where the patient can apply certain feelings or emotions towards the therapist.

The concept of transference in psychoanalysis was first developed in 1895 by the German psychologist Sigmund Freud. In his book “The Studies of Hysteria” he described the intensity of feelings that developed during his own experiences in therapy with patients, especially with a particular patient. Freud used the concept of transference to refer to the emotional displacement of the psyche. This phenomenon was discovered by the author during a psychoanalytic treatment that required his full attention, the case of Anna O.

The case of Anna O

Anna O was a patient who began to be treated by the Austrian doctor and psychologist Josef Breuer, for a condition that carried a series of symptoms that included visual disturbances, hallucinations, partial paralysis and speech problems, while she took care of her father who was pursuing a fatal illness. Due to the intensity with which the patient turned her affections towards him, Breuer decided to diagnose her with Hysteria or Histrionic Personality Disorder and interrupt the treatment.

Freud, upon learning of the interruption of treatment, contacted Breuer and suggested that he continue with the treatment. She promised to help him manage her patient’s emotions and concluded that Anna O’s emotions were not really related to her therapist, but rather she transferred her unconscious contents onto him.

From 1880 to 1882 Anna O followed a continuous treatment, in which Breuer discovered that talking about her experiences seemed to offer some relief from her patient’s symptoms. By reliving or bringing her unconscious memories to consciousness, the patient was able to overcome her symptoms and over time was able to progressively recover from her mental condition.

Patient-therapist transfer

The transfer from the patient to the therapist occurs unconsciously when the patient transfers his emotions to the therapist with whom he is dealing. This transference can be destructive or constructive during therapy, depending on the interaction between the patient and the therapist and the feelings that the patient has on him. Sometimes the patient may unconsciously continue the transference behavior, even if his therapist points it out to him.

In the words of the Argentine psychoanalyst Gabriel Rolón, the transference produces a resistance, since instead of remembering, associating and being able to talk about their unconscious feelings and memories, the patient transfers their affections to the therapist. In this case, the therapist would be like a screen on which the patient projects his fears, his anger, his frustrations and even his wishes.

The transference, paradoxically, is imposed as a phenomenon that presents two opposite faces. On the one hand there is resistance to analysis and on the other a door to access the unconscious mechanisms .

Faced with a transference episode, the therapist must remain firm and not allow himself to doubt or allow himself to be carried away by his emotions, as this could make the therapy ineffective. The therapist must remember that it is important to recognize when his countertransference reactions are interfering with therapy or undermining the therapeutic alliance. Countertransference, which occurs when a therapist transfers his emotions to a person in therapy, is often shown as a reaction to the transference.

“No one has ever said that the analyst should not have feelings about his patients. But he not only has to know how not to give in to them and keep them in place, but also how to use them properly in his technique. ” – Jacques Lacan

During the course of this psychological phenomenon, the patient who is transferring his feelings will be carried away by his past.  It is at this moment that the movement of behaviors and emotions towards the therapist begins.

The psychoanalytic transference process also includes the patient’s expectations of therapy and the therapist. The patient’s expectations can include love, disapproval, resentment, frustration, and abandonment among other emotions. The patient may unconsciously try to sabotage therapy, even behaving in a certain way so that the reactions that he expects from his therapist are produced.

Other types of transfers

The patient-therapist transference is not the only type of psychoanalytic transference that exists; in fact, the transfer process can be found within any relationship, be it family, work or academic.

Paternal transfer

This form of transference occurs when the individual views another person as a father or an idealized father figure. The person can be viewed with admiration; as someone with power, wisdom and authority. The subject making the transfer can expect protection or parental behaviors from this person.
A negative parental transfer can cause strong feelings of rejection and worthlessness.

Maternal transfer

In the first years of life, mothers are the source of unconditional love. After separation, from birth they recreate a new unity, sustaining us and making them feel as one. Mothers are also the source of ultimate authority, and a threat of separation can be very powerful.

Maternal transference occurs when the subject sees another person as a maternal figure or an idealized mother. This figure is often viewed as loving, protective, and influential, and nurture and comfort are often expected of her. However, if the subject experienced a negative relationship with his mother, he may present feelings of rejection and displeasure towards the person on whom he projects his mother figure.

You may also be interested in:   Types of bullying

Maternal transference is often deeper, with more primitive and emotional elements than paternal transference.

Transfer between siblings

In childhood when one or both parents are absent, they can be replaced by sibling relationships. This is a pattern that is becoming increasingly common as families separate, or if a parent is absent or spends long hours at work.

Unlike the transfer between parents, this type of transfer is generally not represented by the behavior of the leader or the one with the greatest power, but by interactions between equals or as a team. This type of transfer can occur between friends, co-workers and even between the same siblings.

In some cases when families separate, the younger brother will initiate his transfer to the older brother. According to the sex of the latter, it will depend on whether it is transferred as a maternal figure (in the case of women) or a father figure (in the case of men).

Non-family transfer

The transference can also occur between two people who do not maintain a bond as close as the family bond or the patient-therapist bond. Transferred unfamiliar patterns can happen to any individual who plays a role in a person’s life. In fact, generally people are not treated as they really are, but are treated according to the perception of each subject (subjective perception) and the idealization that he has about that person.

Usually they tend to create idealized stereotypes and prototypes of other individuals , for example: policemen, doctors, teachers, psychologists, etc. These stereotypes and prototypes are used in people when they need to find the appropriate roles.

Transfer of acquired reactions

In ancient times (17th century), psychology considered the soul or spirit as a group of harmonic powers that acted independently of the mind. At that time they spoke of aptitudes or faculties, for example, the faculty of perception, memory , knowledge, etc. It was believed that the use of these skills or abilities would confer a greater scope of them.

Any effort employed in the acquisition of skills and knowledge would never be an effort in vain, since that ability would not be lost, but would be enhanced and would contribute to the stimulation of new faculties. A person who used memory a lot, in addition to enriching his intellectual life, acquired a greater potential of it and benefited it by improving, for example, the ability to remember.

According to ancient psychology, it is understood as a transfer to the process or gain of the exercise of a power or capacity, which is granted to another capacity not previously exercised.

It was said that there was a transfer of acquired reaction when the progress obtained in the course of learning a certain form of activity, led to improvements in the exercise of a different activity more or less close. The acquisition of the habit would be favored through the transfer effect when acquiring similar habits.

Later years, with the creation of modern psychology and the evolution of teaching, it was shown that this conception of transference was not entirely correct.

Transfer in teaching

The presumption that the abilities or faculties of the mind could be deployed autonomously and uniformly gave rise to the theory of formal teaching. When formal teaching was created, the content of what was learned was not taken into account, but more attention was paid to the development of a faculty when it is exercised . Intelligence based on acquired knowledge was not prioritized, on the contrary, it was believed that the fundamental factor for the development of intelligence was the exercise of mental abilities, such as: memory, perception, attention , abstraction, etc.

With the rise of modern psychology, different observations and experiments were made that discredited the theory of faculties and the theory of formal teaching. Since then, it cannot be clearly accepted that the exercise of a mental ability can develop certain general “powers”, such as memory or reflection, since these powers are reduced to the operation of a series of diverse processes.

Édouard Claparède (Swiss neurologist and psychologist) proposes that each thought and each movement involves processes of different categories, such as memory, sensations, judgment, control of the conscious and subconscious, of feelings and emotions, etc.

A transfer of reaction will depend on the identity of the content, the method and the mental attitude of the subject , being proportional to the intelligence capacity of the same.

According to some authors, such as Edward Thorndike, there is only transference when there are identical elements in exercised and non-exercised activity. Identical elements may consist of: content, method, attitudes, and general facts. The mental attitude, like the favorable disposition to study or will, may present a greater possibility of a transference of acquired reactions to occur. For example: a favorable attitude in learning certain knowledge predisposes the individual to learning similar knowledge.

Website | + posts

Hello Readers, I am Nikki Bella a Psychology student. I have always been concerned about human behavior and the mental processes that lead us to act and think the way we do. My collaboration as an editor in the psychology area of ​​Well Being Pole has allowed me to investigate further and expand my knowledge in the field of mental health; I have also acquired great knowledge about physical health and well-being, two fundamental bases that are directly related and are part of all mental health.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *