Transference and countertransference in psychoanalysis

A transfer of emotions? 

Psychoanalysis, a discipline founded by Sigmund Freud in the early 20th century, explores the depths of the human mind with the aim of understanding the unconscious motivations that influence our behaviour and emotions. Among the fundamental concepts of psychoanalysis, he describes the transference mechanism, which would be redefined by his contemporaries, the French psychoanalysts Laplanche and Pontalis, in their Language of psychoanalysis.

An unconscious displacement of past emotions  

Laplanche and Pontalis define transference as ‘a process through which unconscious desires are displaced onto certain objects in the context of a certain type of relation established with them’.

It is the displacement of feelings, desires and relationships previously experienced with important people in the person's psychic life, onto another person. According to Freud and his contemporaries, transference is one of the conditions for ‘healing’, as it brings to light the emotions buried in the person's unconscious.

Positive and negative transference

There are two types of transference:

• Positive transference, which concerns the displacement of affectionate feelings,
  
• Negative transference, which involves the displacement of hostile feelings.

The psychological process at source: the projection 

Transference is fuelled by an archaic process known as projection. It consists of transporting an element of a person's internal psychic space (in this case the emotions of a relationship) into a world outside the person, i.e. onto an object or a person.

A response: countertransference 

A therapist is also involved in the relationship that develops between them and their patient. Contrary to the well-known image of a cold, neutral psychoanalyst, a therapist is not indifferent, nor are they without reaction to their patient's transferential attitude, whether it be positive or negative.

Freud defined counter-transference as ‘all the reactions of the analyst to the transference of their patient, including the feelings projected into them by the patient’.

Counter-transference manifests itself in subjective reactions that go beyond the role of a therapist, revealing their sensitivity to the patient's projections. For example, a therapist may identify too much with the client's stories and share too much information about themselves, or become too critical or too supportive of the client. These non-professional types of behaviour are often the expression of counter-transference.

Transference and counter-transference go hand in hand

One cannot exist without the other. The therapist-patient relationship induces past, unconscious resonances in both. Counter-transference may refer specifically to the therapist's reactions to the patient's transference, or more broadly to the therapist's transferential phenomena towards the patient. These reactions are unconscious and are more difficult to handle or control.

If it is not clearly identified, counter-transference can become an insurmountable obstacle. If the transferential bond becomes too strong, the psychoanalyst is obliged to end the therapy for the sake of the patient.