Conservative Critiques: Transference in the Asocial Paradigm
Overview: Types of Conservative Critiques
Conservative critiques, as I said earlier, retain the dichotomy of transference and realistic perception, but argue
that the standard qualifications of the screen function of the analyst require amplification. Some conservative critics
like Strachey (1934) and Loewald (1960) offer reconceptualizations of the real, benign interpersonal influence of
the analyst in the process without any recommendations for changes in prevailing practice. Others, like Stone
(1961) and Kohut (1977) combine such reconceptualization with advocacy of less restraint and more friendly,
spontaneous involvement than is customary. In this context, Freud is often cited as a practitioner who was
extraordinarily free in his manner of relating to his patients.
Strachey, Loewald, Stone and Kohut have in common some kind of amplification of the realistically benign and
facilitating aspects of the therapist's influence, although, to be sure, what is benign and facilitating in Stone and
Kohut includes a certain optimal element of frustration or disappointment. The other major subdivision of
conservative critiques are those which emphasize the importance and prevalence of objective perceptions of
countertransference which, it is argued, fall outside the province of transference. Langs (1978) mounts the most
systematic and thorough critique of this kind. Perhaps the clearest example of all the conservative critics is
Greenson (1971) whose "real relationship" includes the patient's experience of both the working alliance and of
countertransference and unequivocally excludes the experience of the transference.
Hans Loewald and James Strachey
A good example of a primarily conservative critique of the blank screen fallacy which advocates a greater
emphasis on the benign facilitating aspects of the analyst as a real person (or object) without any suggestions for
changes in technique is that of Loewald (1960). I say primarily conservative because there are ambiguous hints in
Loewald's position of a more radical critique which would not dichotomize transference and reality, although I
believe the overall thrust of his position is undeniably conservative. Loewald represents the classical position to
which he objects as follows (and I quote it at some length because this is one of the clearest statements of the
position):
The theoretical bias is the view of the psychic apparatus as a closed system. Thus, the analyst is seen, not as a
co-actor on the analytic stage on which the childhood development, culminating in the infantile neurosis, is restaged
and reactivated in the development, crystallization and resolution of the transference neurosis, but as a reflecting
mirror, albeit of the unconscious, and characterized by scrupulous neutrality.
This neutrality of the analyst appears to be required (i) in the interest of scientific objectivity, in order to keep the field
of observation from being contaminated by the analyst's own emotional intrusions; and (ii) to guarantee a tabula rasa
for the patient's transferences … the analyst is supposed to function not only as an observer of certain processes, but
as a mirror which actively reflects back to the patient the latter's conscious and partially his unconscious processes
through verbal communication. A specific aspect of this neutrality is that the analyst must avoid falling into the role of
the environmental figure (or of his opposite) the relationship to whom the patient is transferring to the analyst (p. 17).
While not discarding this position entirely, Loewald is concerned about the fact that it leaves something out or
lends itself to a lack of sufficient attention to the influence of the analyst as a real object:
[The analyst's] objectivity cannot mean the avoidance of being available to the patient as an object. The objectivity of
the analyst has reference to the patient's transference distortions. Increasingly, through the objective analysis of them,
the analyst becomes not only potentially but actually available as a new object, by eliminating step by step
impediments, represented by these transferences, to a new object-relationship. There is a tendency to consider the
analyst's availability as an object merely as a device on his part to attract transferences onto himself. His availability
is seen in terms of his being a screen or mirror onto which the patient projects his transferences, and which reflect
them back to him in the form of interpretations. …
This is only a half truth. The analyst in actuality does not only reflect the transference distortions. In his
interpretations he implies aspects of undistorted reality which the patient begins to grasp step by step as transferences
are interpreted. This undistorted reality is mediated to the patient by the analyst, mostly by the process of chiseling
away the transference distortions … (p. 18)
Here it is clear that Loewald is dichotomizing transference and non-transference experience along the lines of
neurotic distortion on the one hand and a new appreciation of the real, presumably health promoting aspects of the
analyst on the other. He goes on to elaborate on the therapeutic effects associated with the experience of
collaboration with the real analyst in the process of self-discovery.
Loewald's position has a forerunner in Strachey (1934) in that Strachey too emphasized the new, real
interpersonal influence of the analyst in the analytic situation. Loewald sees this new real influence in terms of the
patient's identification with the analyst's higher level of ego functioning, particularly with his rational perspective as
it is brought to bear upon the patient's own neurotic tendencies. Strachey saw a new real influence more in terms of
the patient's identification with the analyst's acceptance of the patient's hitherto repressed impulses, so that the
modification that occurs involves a softening of the punitive tendencies of the patient's superego, rather than, as in
Loewald, a strengthening of the reflective integrating capacities of his ego.
Leo Stone and Heinz Kohut
Whereas Strachey and Loewald explicitly disclaim any intent to influence technique, Stone (1961) who also is
interested in the patient's perceptions of the real, human qualities of the therapist, is concerned about the excessively
impersonal, cold, stiff manner in which he believes many analysts approach their patients, and takes an unequivocal
stance in favor of a more natural, friendly and spontaneous manner. Stone takes issue with the implication that
scrupulous neutrality and non-responsiveness will allow for the emergence of pure transference ideas
uncontaminated by any interpersonal influence. Instead, certain kinds of frustrations associated with mechanically
strict adherence to the so-called "rule of abstinence" will, Stone believes, amount to very powerful stimuli, inducing
reactions, which, if anything, will be less readily understood in terms of their roots in the individual (see, for
example, pp. 45–46).
Stone is clear in his rejection of the notion that transference fantasies will crop up spontaneously if the analyst
manages to keep his personal human qualities or reactions out of the patient's purview in keeping with what Stone
believes is the prevailing understanding of proper analytic conduct. But what is Stone's view of the relationship
between transference and reality when the analytic situation is modified in accord with his recommendations? In
this respect, Stone (1961) is more ambiguous. At times he seems to be saying that the transference will, under those
circumstances, include realistic perceptions of the analyst and that this is not only not regrettable but actually
desirable:
For all patients, to the degree that they are removed from the psychotic, have an important investment in their real and
objective perceptions; and the interplay between these and the transference requires a certain minimal if variable
resemblance, if the latter is to be effectively mobilized. When mobilized, it is in operational fact of experience, always
an integrated phenomenon, in which actual perceptions, to varying degree, must participate (p. 41).
However, in certain of his remarks and despite many qualifications, Stone seems to adhere to the standard
dichotomy of transference and reality. For this reason I believe I am justified in classifying him as a conservative
critic of the screen function of the analyst. For example consider this rather unequivocal stance:
I should like to state that clarity both in principle and in everyday communication, is best served by confining the
unqualified term "transference" to that aspect or fraction of a relationship which is motivated by persistent unmodified
wishes (or other attitudes) toward an actual important personage of the past, which tend to invest a current individual
in a sort of misidentification with the unconscious image of the past personage (p. 66).
Stone is sympathetic to the views advanced by Tower, Racker, and others which point to the usefulness of
countertransference in understanding transference and which connote what Stone terms a "diminution of the rigid
status barrier between analyst and analysand" (1961, p. 80). However his preoccupation is decidedly with the
question: how should the analyst behave? It is very much less with the question: how should the patient's
experience of the analyst be understood? Whatever the virtues of Stone's position, what is obscured by his
emphasis on the therapist's behavior is the patient's capability to understand that the analyst's manifest verbal and
nonverbal behavior can conceal or carry a myriad of latent, more or less conscious attitudes and motives. I think
Stone's position exemplifies a particular variant of those conservative critiques of the screen concept which stress
the importance of the benign human attributes of the analyst. Instead of arguing that in addition to transference,
weight should be given to the patient's experience of the analyst's real benign qualities, this variant argues that the
analyst's humanness draws out the transference, especially the positive transference. In a sense, instead of the
analyst functioning as a blank screen in relation to the transference, he is seen as a kind of magnet for it; albeit a
very human one (pp. 108–109). Again, while the idea may not be wrong, it is not the whole story, and the part of
the story that it leaves out or obscures is what lies at the core of the radical critiques, namely that the therapist's
outward behavior, however it is consciously intended, does not and cannot control the patient's perceptions and
interpretations of the analyst's inner experience. As I said earlier, what the radical critic challenges is the view of
the patient as a naive observer of the analyst's behavior. He argues against the expectation that, to the degree that
the patient is rational, he will take the analyst's outward behavior and/or his conscious intent at face value. It is the
taking of the analyst's outward behavior and/or his conscious intention and experience of himself as the basis for
defining reality in the analytic situation that is truly the hallmark of the standard view of transference as distortion.
And it is in this sense thatStone, with all his emphasis on what is appropriate outward behavior on the part of the
analyst, leans towards thestandard paradigm and can be categorized as a conservative critic of the notion that, ideally,
the analyst shouldfunction like a screen.
I believe that Kohut's position on the screen function of the analyst, although it is, of course, embedded in a
different theoretical context, can be classed with that of Stone as a special type of conservative critique. Kohut
(1977) makes it clear that while it is particularly important in the case of disorders of the self it is also important in
the case of the classical neuroses that the analyst not behave in an excessively cold and unfriendly manner. He
believes that "analytic neutrality … should be defined as the responsiveness to be expected, on an average, from
persons who have devoted their life to helping others with the aid of insights obtained via the empathic immersion
into their inner life" (p. 252). But Kohut (1977), like Stone, conveys the impression that a friendly, naturally
responsive attitude on the part of the analyst will promote the unfolding of the transference, whether classical or
narcissistic, without specific reference to other aspects of the analyst's personality. For example, he writes:
The essential transference (or the sequence of the essential transferences) is defined by pre-analytically established
internal factors in the analysand's personality structure, and the analyst's influence on the course of the analysis is
therefore important only insofar as he—through interpretations made on the basis of correct or incorrect empathic
closures—either promotes or impedes the patient's progress on his predetermined path (p. 217).
Especially in the case of the classical transference neurosis, Kohut is clear that the analyst does function as a
screen for elaboration of transference ideas although he also facilitates change through empathic responsiveness and
interpretation. This model follows the line of conservative critics like Stone because the encouragement that is
given to the analyst to express his humanness does nothing to alter the notion that the analyst as a real person is not
implicated in the unfolding of the transference proper.
In the case of transferences associated with the disorders of the self, which Kohut increasingly viewed as the
underlying disturbance even in the classical neuroses, the analyst as a real person is implicated more directly
insofar as his empathy facilitates the self-selfobject tie that the patient's development requires. More precisely,
the sequence of empathy, minor failures in empathy, and rectification of such failures promotes the "transmuting
internalizations" which result in repair of the deficits in the development of the self which the patient brings to the
analysis. However, it would seem that the whole complexity of the analyst's personal response to the patient is
not something the patient would attend to in a way that was associated with any special psychological importance.
To the extent that the patient is suffering from a disorder of the self, or a narcissistic disorder, he presumably does
not experience the analyst as a separate person with needs, motives, defenses, and interests of his own. One might
say that the patient is concerned about breaches in empathy and that he reacts strongly to them, but that he does not
necessarily account for such failures or explain them to himself by attributing particular countertransference
difficulties to the analyst which then become incorporated into the transference. In fact, to the degree that the
patient is suffering from a disorder of the self, and therefore is experiencing the analyst as a selfobject, he is, by
definition, a naive observer of the analyst as a separate, differentiated object. Thus, I believe I am justified in
classifying Kohut as a conservative critic of the screen function of the analyst even taking into consideration his
ideas about the narcissistic transferences.4
Robert Langs
Whereas Loewald, Strachey, Stone and Kohut are concerned with the fact that the screen concept lends itself to
a deemphasis of the "real" therapeutic, interpersonal influence of the analyst, others have been concerned more with
its tendency to obscure the importance and prevalence of real neurotogenic influences that the therapist exerts via
his countertransference. Here again, the critique is conservative in form insofar as it merely expands upon one of
the standard qualifications of the blank screen concept. A carefully elaborated critique of this kind is that of Robert
Langs. No psychoanalytic theorist has written more extensively about the implications of the patient's ability to
interpret theanalyst's manifest behavior as betraying latent countertransference. In Langs' view, the patient is
constantlymonitoring the analyst's countertransference attitudes and his associations can often be understood as
"commentaries" on them (1978, p. 509).
However, despite his unusual interactional emphasis, Langs must be classified as a conservative critic of the
blank screen fallacy because he is unequivocal about reserving the term transference for the distorted perception of
the therapist, whereas accurate perceptions fall outside the realm of the transference. Thus, he writes, for example:
4The self psychology literature certainly includes discussion of likely countertransference reactions to particular kinds of narcissistic
transferences (e.g., Kohut, 1971) ; (Wolf, 1979), but these discussions omit consideration of the patient's specific ideas about the nature of the
countertransference.
Within the bipersonal field the patient's relationship with the analyst has both transference and nontransference
components. The former are essentially distorted and based on pathological, intrapsychic unconscious fantasies,
memories, and introjects, while the latter are essentially non-distorted and based on valid unconscious perceptions and
introjections of the analyst, his conscious and unconscious psychic state and communications, and his mode of
interacting (p. 506).
For Langs what is wrong with the classical position is that it overestimates the prevalence of relatively pure,
uncontaminated transference. Because countertransference errors are relatively ubiquitous in prevailing practice
and because the patient is preconsciously always on the lookout for them, what dominates most psychoanalytic
transactions are unconscious attempts by the patient to adapt to this current reality and even to alter it by trying
indirectly to "cure" the analyst of his interfering psychopathology. To be sure, even the patient's valid perceptions
can be points of departure for "intrapsychic elaborations" which bear the stamp of the patient's psychopathology.
Nevertheless, the main thrust of all of Langs' writings is that a certain environment can be established which will be
relatively free of countertransference and in which the patient will therefore feel safe to engage in a very special
kind of communication, one which can take place in this environment and nowhere else. This special kind of
communication is, like dreams, a richly symbolic expression of deep unconscious wishes and fantasies that have
little relation to the actual person of the analyst. These are the true transference wishes and fantasies. The patient is
always on the verge of retreating from this kind of communication because he experiences it as potentially
dangerous at a very primitive level to himself or to the analyst, and betrayals of countertransference (whether
seductive orattacking or whatever) invariably prevent, interrupt, or severely limit this unique kind of
communication.
Langs' position is based upon the same absolute view of reality which is implicit in any position which retains
the dichotomy between distorted and undistorted perception of interpersonal events. Langs believes, for example,
that strict adherence to a prescribed set of rules constituting what he calls the "basic frame" will not be
interpreted—at least not accurately—as any kind of expression of countertransference which could endanger the
kind of communication he wants to foster. By the same token, violations of the frame will be perceived and
responded to in this way by virtually all patients.5
Langs appears to believe that there is a certain universal language which always carries at least general
unconscious meaning. He will not claim to know specifically what it means to a particular patient that the therapist
allows him to use his phone, or that he changes his appointment time, or that he fails to charge for a cancelled
appointment, or that he tape records a session. But he does claim to know that all patients are likely to see such
behaviors correctly as reflecting some sort of deep, unresolved, pathological conflict in the analyst. Conversely, he
believes it is possible for the analyst to behave in a way which will persuade the patient that no such issues are
active in the analyst to any significant degree, that is, to a degree which, objectively speaking, would warrant
anxiety that the analyst's attitudes are dominated by countertransference. Thus, the analyst, with help perhaps from
a supervisor or from his own analyst, can decide with some degree of confidence when the patient is reading his
unconscious motives correctly, which would represent a non-transference response, and when he is merely
fantasizing and distorting because of the influence of the transference.
The conservativism of Langs' critique of the screen model in psychoanalysis is particularly ironic given the
enthusiasm with which he champions the more radical positions of other theorists such as Searles (1978–1979) and
Racker (1968). Langsfeels that these theorists (especially Searles) inspired many of his own ideas and he conveys the
impression that insome sense he is taking up where they left off. However, because Langs actually retreats to the
standard dichotomyof transference and non-transference experience on the basis of distorting and non-distorting
perceptions of thereality of the analyst's attitudes, I believe he actually takes a step back from his own sources of
inspiration ratherthan a step forward.
5According to Langs, by maintaining the frame and intervening in an optimal manner, the therapist provides the patient with a secure
holding environment. Langs' account of the nature and importance of this kind of environment in the analytic process complements his account of
the importance of countertransference errors, so that he, like Greenson, actually elaborates on both of the standard qualifications of the screen
concept.
Ralph Greenson
Perhaps the theorist who best exemplifies a conservative critique of the blank screen fallacy is Greenson (1965)
; (1971). Greenson's "real relationship" encompasses both the patient's accurate perceptions of the benign aspects of
the analyst and his perceptions of the analyst's countertransference expressions, and Greenson's position is an
emphatic objection to the tendency he sees to underestimate the inevitably important role of the real relationship in
the analytic process. There is nothing in Greenson which alters in the slightest the standard understanding of
transference as distortion and the standard dichotomy of transference and undistorted perception of the analyst. He
writes (1971):
The two outstanding characteristics of a transference reaction are: (1) It is an undiscriminating, non-selective
repetition of the past, and (2) It is inappropriate, it ignores or distorts reality (p. 217)
.
In contrast to the transference, Greenson states:
The meaning of "real" in real relationship implies (1) the sense of being genuine and not synthetic or artificial and (2)
it also means realistic and not inappropriate or fantastic (p. 218).
The extent to which Greenson is wedded to this dichotomy is betrayed by the fact that he cannot find his way
out of it, even when it seems like he is trying to. Thus, for example, he says:
I must add that in all transference reactions there is some germ of reality, and in all real relationships there is some
element of transference (p. 218).
Here he seems to be saying that transference itself is not completely lacking in some sort of realistic basis,
although the word "germ" suggests a very common kind of lip-service to this idea: the element of reality is
considered to be so slight as to be hardly worth mentioning much less making an issue of in one's interpretive work.
But even this concession is lost immediately in Greenson's very next sentence which he has in italics and which is
clearly intended as a restatement or paraphrase of the first:
All object relations consist of different admixtures and blendings of real and transference components (p. 218).
Now the idea that transference includes something real is superseded by the much blander notion that all
relationships include something real as well as transference. In other words, the dichotomy of transference and
realistic perception is retained. www.psychspace.com心理学空间网
