What is transference?
Psychoanalysts discovered early in their work that patients views of the analyst may be unrealistic. An analyst with a quiet, reserved manner may be perceived as an oppressive tyrant. Alternatively, a patient may become convinced that the analyst is in love with her even though no such feeling has been expressed. These types of feelings often derive from attitudes toward significant individuals in a patient’s past such as parents, teachers, or siblings. Sometimes the feelings toward the analyst represent actual feelings about a person in the patient’s past, and sometimes the feelings are those of a desired relationship with a significant individual, while at other times they may be the result of more or less accurate perceptions of the analyst. Re-experiencing these feelings in the context of the analytic relationship allows a person to work them through consciously, in a way they could not when small and powerless.
