Abstract:This article presents a qualitative research interview method informed by psychoanalysis, which can collect data beyond the subjective report of the participants. The method has been used to study acquisition of psychodynamic understanding and therapy technique among student therapists in psychology. Within the psychodynamic tradition, the subjective report of every person is viewed as potentially distorted by defense processes. Moreover, relational patterns in an interaction are viewed as significant data abo… Show more
“…Although researchers are trained to take care to be as neutral and facilitative as possible to guard against overly influencing participants’ responses, participants nonetheless apprehend multiple aspects of the researcher's personhood from his or her manner, physical appearance and manifest personality characteristics. Thus the researcher–participant relationship, and indeed all human relationships, operates on, and has ongoing resonance within and between, the conscious, preconscious and unconscious levels of both participant and researcher (Hollway & Jefferson, ; Stromme et al ., ). A distinctive feature of the researcher–participant relationship is that it is a working alliance.…”
Section: The Qualitative Research Relationshipmentioning
confidence: 97%
“…The intersubjective nature of the research encounter shares similarities with the psychotherapist–patient relationship (Stromme et al ., ). Sigmund Freud, who originally developed the psychoanalytic technique, first introduced the concept of transference as the patient re‐experiencing aspects of his or her early emotional life, including wishes and feelings, toward persons from his or her past, in relation to the psychoanalyst (Freud, /1953).…”
Section: The Intersubjective Nature Of Shared Identitiesmentioning
confidence: 97%
“…Stromme et al . () describe a ‘role‐reversing interaction’ as participants ‘seduce’ researchers into certain roles. Gabbard and Hobday () describe patients as unconsciously recreating their internal object relations in the transference–countertransference relationship with their psychotherapist.…”
“…Researchers need to be fully conscious of their subjectivity and how this impacts on and transforms the research (Brown, ), so to safeguard the entire research process. This practice requires the researcher to engage in extensive professional reflections (Stromme et al ., ) in an attempt to understand the nature of their interactions with participants.…”
Section: Benefits and Safeguards: A Researcher's Psychoanalytic Reflementioning
confidence: 99%
“…The data collection method I used for the research project referred to above was an adapted version of the psychoanalytically informed research interview (from Stromme et al ., ; Cartwright, ; Kvale, ). Non‐disabled mothers of visibly physically disabled children were the participants.…”
Qualitative research in general and the psychoanalytically informed research interview method specifically, can be emotionally demanding on researchers as they form relationships with participants. This is especially the case when researchers and participants share particular identities and experiences. In this paper I reflect on my experience of interviewing mothers raising children with a visible physical disability about their maternal subjectivity. At times this was an emotionally demanding and ethically challenging process as participants closely identified with certain aspects of my identity, particularly with my visible physical disability and motherhood peculiarities. Often participants unexpectedly reversed our roles, asking me intimate questions. I will deliberate these dilemmas using interview material. I argue for a mindful blurring with participants when this occurs. Using certain psychoanalytic-researcher concepts of intersubjectivity, transference-countertransference and psychoanalyticresearcher thirdness helped me successfully navigate these encounters. I will also explore the rich participant psychic functioning that was generated from this intersubjective relationship between myself and the participants.
“…Although researchers are trained to take care to be as neutral and facilitative as possible to guard against overly influencing participants’ responses, participants nonetheless apprehend multiple aspects of the researcher's personhood from his or her manner, physical appearance and manifest personality characteristics. Thus the researcher–participant relationship, and indeed all human relationships, operates on, and has ongoing resonance within and between, the conscious, preconscious and unconscious levels of both participant and researcher (Hollway & Jefferson, ; Stromme et al ., ). A distinctive feature of the researcher–participant relationship is that it is a working alliance.…”
Section: The Qualitative Research Relationshipmentioning
confidence: 97%
“…The intersubjective nature of the research encounter shares similarities with the psychotherapist–patient relationship (Stromme et al ., ). Sigmund Freud, who originally developed the psychoanalytic technique, first introduced the concept of transference as the patient re‐experiencing aspects of his or her early emotional life, including wishes and feelings, toward persons from his or her past, in relation to the psychoanalyst (Freud, /1953).…”
Section: The Intersubjective Nature Of Shared Identitiesmentioning
confidence: 97%
“…Stromme et al . () describe a ‘role‐reversing interaction’ as participants ‘seduce’ researchers into certain roles. Gabbard and Hobday () describe patients as unconsciously recreating their internal object relations in the transference–countertransference relationship with their psychotherapist.…”
“…Researchers need to be fully conscious of their subjectivity and how this impacts on and transforms the research (Brown, ), so to safeguard the entire research process. This practice requires the researcher to engage in extensive professional reflections (Stromme et al ., ) in an attempt to understand the nature of their interactions with participants.…”
Section: Benefits and Safeguards: A Researcher's Psychoanalytic Reflementioning
confidence: 99%
“…The data collection method I used for the research project referred to above was an adapted version of the psychoanalytically informed research interview (from Stromme et al ., ; Cartwright, ; Kvale, ). Non‐disabled mothers of visibly physically disabled children were the participants.…”
Qualitative research in general and the psychoanalytically informed research interview method specifically, can be emotionally demanding on researchers as they form relationships with participants. This is especially the case when researchers and participants share particular identities and experiences. In this paper I reflect on my experience of interviewing mothers raising children with a visible physical disability about their maternal subjectivity. At times this was an emotionally demanding and ethically challenging process as participants closely identified with certain aspects of my identity, particularly with my visible physical disability and motherhood peculiarities. Often participants unexpectedly reversed our roles, asking me intimate questions. I will deliberate these dilemmas using interview material. I argue for a mindful blurring with participants when this occurs. Using certain psychoanalytic-researcher concepts of intersubjectivity, transference-countertransference and psychoanalyticresearcher thirdness helped me successfully navigate these encounters. I will also explore the rich participant psychic functioning that was generated from this intersubjective relationship between myself and the participants.
Despite increasing recognition of the importance of multicultural sensitivity in psychotherapy, studies offering in-depth exploration of client experiences are relatively rare, and studies exploring both client and therapist perspectives even less common. This paper explores how clients and therapists experience the presence of racial identity in psychotherapy. Eleven client-trainee therapist pairs attending a free clinic in Johannesburg, South Africa, were interviewed and transcripts were qualitatively analyzed utilizing psychoanalytic research methods. This paper explores three core themes: the difficulty of talking about racial/ethnic identity; the uneasy relationship between psychotherapy and culture;
Recent studies have identified a history of anxiety as playing a crucial role in the development of trauma responses in mothers of premature neonates. This paper explores this link in more depth, examining how previous relational experience appears to influence mothers' experiences of premature birth and their infants in the context of a neonatal high care ward. Utilizing case study methodology, the narratives of three mothers are analyzed in order to better understand their experiences and their mental states. The trauma of engaging with a premature infant appears to reactivate dissociated self‐states associated with childhood experiences of loss and absence for mothers, manifesting in fragmented narratives of their own and their infant's experience.
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