RESEARCH NOTE ON TRANSFERENCE AND TELE

Abstract

There is a tendency to ascribe many irrational factors in the behavior of therapists and patients in group situations to transference and counter- transference.

I. It takes Tele to choose the right therapist and group partner, it takes

transference to misjudge the therapist and to choose group partners who produce unstable relationships in a given activity.

II. The greater the temporal distance of an individual patient is from other individuals whom he has encountered in the past and with whom he was engaged in significant relations, direct or symbolic, the more inaccurate will be his perception of them and his evaluation of their relationship to him and to each other. The dynamic effect of experiences which occur earlier in the life of an individual may be greater than the more recent ones but it is the inaccuracy of perception and the excess of projected feeling which is important in transference; in other words, he will be less perceiving the effect which experiences have on him the older they are and less aware of the degree to which he is coerced to project their images upon individuals in the present.