Putting Practice Into Theory: Making the Training Analyst System Coherent

Abstract

The question of the training analysis demands a complicated set of answers that engage the issue at different levels of human organization. Historically, the training analysis has been the central feature of the tripartite model of psychoanalytic education. Internal and external pressures have burdened the training analysis and called its legitimacy into question. This problem of legitimacy amounts to a lack of coherence in the training analyst (TA) system. This lack engenders idealized fantasies of the role of the TA, in which the TA embodies special talents and attributes, and of the system that sanctions that role. This idealization is haunted by its opposite: a melancholic devaluation of psychoanalysis and a fear that it will collapse. Recent literature on the analyst's position in the psychoanalytic process emphasizes the analyst's position as decentered and conflicted. The analyst's decentered, conflicted status goes against this idealizing impulse. An attempt is made to wed analytic values, and what we know about the analyst's role in the analytic process, into a more coherent, consistent position regarding the analysis of candidates.

A National Survey of Candidates

“…Candidates appear distressed by a negative or conflictual atmosphere at their institutes. Problems in institute functioning and conflicts over training standards have in recent years been recognized with increasing frequency and urgency (Berman 2004;Kernberg 1996Kernberg , 2000Kernberg , 2006Kernberg , 2007Reeder 2001;San Martino 2003;Wilson 2010). The training analyst system and its impact on psychoanalytic education have been debated actively on psychoanalytic list serves and in the literature, but in this study these issues were not of major importance to candidates.…”

“…These include educational roles, with the training analyst serving as teacher, supervisor, advisor, and mentor. Complex ethical and technical issues have long been debated concerning the role of the analyst in relation to the candidate analysand (Calef and Weinshel 1980;Gitelson 1948Gitelson , 1954Greenacre 1966;Orgel 2002;Weinshel 1982;Wilson 2010), but it appears from our findings that a personal therapist or analyst may play a key role in both the discovery of psychoanalysis and in encouraging candidates to pursue training. This study did not specify the degree to which therapists or analysts directly encouraged candidates to pursue psychoanalytic training, or if these decisions were made on the basis of complex identifications, transference fantasies, or other factors.…”

A questionnaire/interview comparison of satisfaction with training analysis to satisfaction with analysis by a nontraining analyst: Implications for training analysis.

“…1Arlow, 1972; Balint, 1954; Bernfeld, 1962; Bezahler, 2008; Bibring, 1954; Bruzzone, Casaula, Jimenez, & Jordan, 1985; Casement, 2005; Cremerius, 1990; Desmond, 2004; Friedman, 1974; Greenacre, 1966; Hinshelwood, 1985; Kächele & Thomä, 2000; Kairys, 1964; Kernberg, 1986, 2000, 2010; Kirsner, 2009; Lewin & Ross, 1960; Lipton, 1988; Lothane, 2007; Masur, 1998; F. McLaughlin, 1967; J. T. McLaughlin, 1973; Meyer, 2007; Nacht, 1954; Nacht, Lebovichi, & Diatkine, 1961; Orgel, 1990; Pfeffer, 1974; Reeder, 2004; Schecter, 1979; Stelzer, 1986; Szasz, 1960; Thomä, 1993; Thomä & Kächele, 1999; Thompson, 1958; Van der Sterren, & Seidenberg, 1975; Wallerstein, 1993, 2010; Weigert, 1955; Wilson, 2010.…”

“…McLaughlin, 1967;J. T. McLaughlin, 1973;Meyer, 2007;Nacht, 1954;Nacht, Lebovichi, & Diatkine, 1961;Orgel, 1990;Pfeffer, 1974;Reeder, 2004;Schecter, 1979;Stelzer, 1986;Szasz, 1960;Thomä, 1993;Thomä & Kächele, 1999;Thompson, 1958;Van der Sterren, & Seidenberg, 1975;Wallerstein, 1993Wallerstein, , 2010Weigert, 1955;Wilson, 2010. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.…”

Comparison of vignette-based ratings of satisfaction with TA and non-TA treatment by training analysts and by nontraining analysts.

“…A variety of difficulties and problems have been identified (see, e.g., Balint, 1954; Bibring, 1954; Nacht, 1954; Weigert, 1955; Thompson, 1958; Lewin & Ross, 1960; Szasz, 1960; Nacht, Lebovichi, & Diatkine, 1961; Greenacre, P. 1966; Bernfeld, S. 1962; Kairys, 1964; McLaughlin, F. 1967; Arlow, 1972; McLaughlin, J.T., 1973; Friedman, L., 1955; Pfeffer, A.Z. 1974; Van der Sterren & Seidenberg, 1975; Schecter, 1979; Bruzzone et al, 1985; Hinshelwood, 1985; Kernberg, 1986; Stelzer, 1986; Lipton, 1988; Cremerius, 1990; Orgel, 1990; Thomä, 1993; Kächele & Thomä, 1998; Masur, 1998; Kächele & Thomä, 2000; Kernberg, 2000; Desmond, 2004; Reeder, 2004; Casement, 2005; Lothane, 2007; Meyer, 2007; Kirsner, 2009; Kernberg, 2010; Wallerstein, 1993; Wallerstein, 2010; Wilson, 2010). Otto Kernberg (2000), a repeated preeminent critic, identified “a tendency to infantilize psychoanalytic candidates, a persisting trend toward isolation from the scientific community, a lack of consistent concern for the total educational experience of candidates, authoritarian management, and a denial of the effects of external, social reality.” (p. 97).…”