Therapists should have a context for discussing self-disclosure that recognizes disparities in analytical models -- for example those stressing the reparative needs of certain patients for 'new objects' as opposed to those focusing solidly on exploration of the patient's internal existence. The group finally attacked the discussion of evidence against and for self-disclosure. "Group members were in agreement that evidence for the usefulness of self-disclosing techniques based on the patient's sense of well being and exhilaration for a session or so after the revelation did not constitute convincing evidence of the benefit of such techniques." (Lansky, 7)
The gender influence of transference is also an area rife with examples and explanations. As Kalb has noted, "Psychoanalytical endeavor reflects some degree of culturally exaggerated normative roles, including tendencies for women to be more nurturing and containing and for men to be more authoritative and interpretive. Gender is merely one element washing into the undulating currents of the highly complex transferential space. At times gender plays a central role and at other times recedes into the background, at times echoing sociocultural prototypes and at other times becoming more fluid. (Kalb, 2002).
In essence, gender roles play a not insignificant role especially in transference and countertransference: Obviously, a patient is less likely to fall in love with a therapist (and vice-versa) if the genders are not such as they are accustomed to. But as Kalb mentions, gender roles are often not central to transference as well.
Countertransferece
As mentioned earlier, countertransference is when the therapist, during the sessions of therapy, begins to develop positive or negative feelings toward the patient. This is actually quite normal during therapy. However, therapists must not and cannot act on such feelings. (Kardas, 1) To act on them is absolutely unethical. Sections 4.05 and 4.07 of APA's Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct state:
4.05 Sexual Intimacies With Current Patients or Clients.
Psychologists do not engage in sexual intimacies with current patients or clients.
4.07 Sexual Intimacies With Former Therapy Patients.
A a) Psychologists do not engage in sexual intimacies with a former therapy patient or client for at least two years after cessation or termination of professional services.
Both of the principles above are, of course, designed with countertransference in mind.
Turning to actual countertransference, one may think of it as an arcane topic; it is certainly an unwieldy word, one which invokes the most abstract of latter-day metapsychological conceptualizations. Indeed, it arose very early and was very immediate: That is precisely why Freud's first collaborator, Joseph Breuer, gave up. He ran away from Anna O. because she aroused him. If transference is in fact projection, countertransference is projective identification -- something elicited by the patient in the therapist: this is called evocative knowledge. For example, here, Anna O. elicited in Breuer a sexual excitement which he found unacceptable and was unbearable to himself and his wife, so he abandoned the work (Gay, 1988, pp. 63-9).
For Freud the transference went from being an annoying interference to an instrument of great value to the main battlefield of the analysis. An analogous story can be told about the countertransference, but it is a story with profound implications. Now, to define countertransference. Freud rarely discussed the topic; he saw countertransference as the patient's influence on the analyst's unconscious. He said that no analyst could go farther than he or she had progressed in his or her own analysis, so the analyst's analysis was all-important. He first mentions the concept in 1910: 'We have become aware of the "countertransference," which arises in [the analyst] as a result of the patient's influence on his unconscious feelings, and we are almost inclined to insist that he shall recognize this countertransference in himself and overcome it. Now that a considerable number of people are practicing psychoanalysis and exchanging their observations with one another, we have noticed that no psychoanalyst goes further than his own complexes and internal resistances permit; and we consequently require that he shall begin his activity with a self-analysis and continually carry it deeper while he is making his own observations on his patients. Anyone who fails to produce results in a self-analysis of this kind may at once give up any idea of being able to treat patients by analysis'" (Young, 8, quoting Freud, 1910, pp. 144-5).
It is often surmised that Freud held a very limited view of countertransference, and he certainly had precious little to say on the topic. However, with respect to the subsequent...
Counseling The difference between law and ethics in counseling In practice, ethics entails grasping and incorporating principles and standards of specific professional organizations. Ethical codes for professionals in the mental healthcare field aim at outlining the responsibility and professional conduct expected of them (Jennings, Sovereign, Bottorff, Mussell, & Vye, 2005). Graduate students have to establish their understanding of ethics theory and apply it in practice, before entering professional practice. As stated by
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