COUNTERTRANSFERENCE (PSYCHOANALYSIS): THE ROLE IN THERAPY - PSYCHOLOGY - 2025

The countertransference is a situation in which a therapist during the course of a clinical trial, develops some kind of negative to positive feelings or her patient. These emotions may be a reflection of the psychologist's unconscious, which has been removed during therapy and directed toward the client.

Countertransference is the opposite of transference, in which the person who develops inappropriate feelings is the one who receives therapy. Due to this phenomenon, the therapist may begin to feel uncomfortable with the patient, with the way the process is taking place, or with himself.

In the same way as transference, this phenomenon is quite common, especially in branches of psychology such as psychoanalysis. If the situation becomes too complicated, the therapist should be able to cut through the process and redirect the patient to another professional.

Countertransference in therapy

Freud's vision

Psychoanalysis was designed precisely with the idea that the phenomenon of transference occurred. Freud's logic was that if the patient felt powerful positive emotions towards his psychologist, he would open up to him more and the therapeutic process would occur more effectively.

In this way, Freud encouraged psychoanalysts to be ambiguous and not to reveal their feelings. Thus, patients would project their beliefs onto them, and assume specific ways of being, ways of behaving and feelings that really did not have to be there.

Thus, Freud's idea was for the patient to feel again as he did in the presence of his parents, or of other authority figures who had influenced him in his childhood.

This sought the purpose of analyzing the relationships produced with them, which for psychoanalysis with key in the development of the personality and in the psychological well-being.

However, Freud was aware that transference was a universal phenomenon, and that it could therefore also occur in the opposite direction.

He did not write much on the subject, but he thought that countertransference could interfere with the proper development of therapy, and that a psychoanalyst who undergoes it should receive psychological help as well.

Modern vision

Since the 1950s, therapists using the psychoanalytic or psychodynamic approach have had a more positive view of countertransference.

Today, developing these emotions is not considered an impediment to developing the process, at least not in all cases or inevitably.

On the contrary, countertransference can serve to provide important data to the therapist regarding the process. These emotions can inform the psychologist about the type of social interactions that the patient forms, and about the unconscious processes that he creates in other people.

For example, if a therapist feels irritated by his patient without really knowing why, he may end up discovering some subtle behaviors of the patient that cause him to unintentionally push other people out of his life.

Origin of feelings

When a therapist realizes that a countertransference process is taking place, they need to consider where their feelings come from.

In some cases, for example, they may be caused by the patient. If so, the situation can be very helpful to the psychologist.

On other occasions, however, emotions (both negative and positive) may be produced by some irrelevant characteristic of the patient, by previous experiences with other clients, or by factors that have nothing to do with the therapy.

Thus, a therapist might feel loving emotions towards a patient for many reasons. Maybe this person is really friendly and awakens these feelings in everyone.

But, on other occasions, it is due to the fact that he resembles the son of the psychologist, or that he is in a vulnerable state due to personal problems.

How to distinguish the origin

Due to the difficulty of distinguishing the origin of one's own feelings, therapists who follow a psychoanalytic or psychodynamic approach must generally seek therapy themselves. In this way, they will be better able to know themselves and understand what is happening to them.

Another possible tool to discover where the countertransference is coming from is for the therapist to ask himself a series of questions to reflect on his feelings.

For example, this emotion that you are feeling, has it appeared many times and with different patients? Does it have to do with any obvious trait of the current client? Is it a strange reaction in the therapist, which is not usually typical of him?

If a therapist examines himself in this way, it will be easier than if the countertransference occurs, it becomes an ally of the process instead of preventing it from being carried out in the right way.

How to deal with countertransference

Dynamic psychoanalysts and psychologists must be very attentive to their own emotions to avoid interfering with the therapeutic process.

Unlike in other branches of psychology, in which the opinions of the professional do not influence the result at all, in these two approaches they can mean the difference between success or failure.

Therefore, the first thing a good therapist has to do in this regard is to be aware of their own feelings. You can do this either by going to therapy, or by working on yourself and examining what's going on inside.

Later, you should be able to put your own emotions aside and act professionally. This is usually very complicated, as psychoanalytic therapy is by its very nature highly professional. However, with enough training it is possible to achieve this.

Finally, if the therapist finds that his emotions are too intense and are interfering with the patient's recovery, he must be honest and end the professional relationship.

In these cases, the most normal thing is to refer the client to another psychologist who can continue with the process without problems.

References

1. "Countertransference, an overview" in: Psychology Today. Retrieved on: June 15, 2018 from Psychology Today: psychologytoday.com.
2. "Countertransference" in: Good Therapy. Retrieved on: June 15, 2018 from Good Therapy: goodtherapy.org.
3. "Countertransference in psychoanalysis and psychotherapy" in: Psychology Today. Retrieved on: June 15, 2018 from Psychology Today: psychologytoday.com.
4. "Countertransference in therapy" in: Harley Therapy. Retrieved on: June 15, 2018 from Harley Therapy: harleytherapy.co.uk.
5. "Countertransference" in: Wikipedia. Retrieved on: June 15, 2018 from Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org.