The Transference Phenomenon In Psychoanalytic Therapy†

The significance of the transference phenomenon impressed Freud so profoundly that he continued through the years to develop his ideas about it. His classical observations on the patient Dora formed the basis for his first formulations of this concept. He says, “What are transferences? They are the new editions or facsimiles of the tendencies and phantasies which are aroused and made conscious during the progress of the analysis; but they have this peculiarity, which is characteristic for their species, that they replace some earlier person by the person of the physician. To put it another way: a whole series of psychological experiences are revived, not as belonging to the past, but as applying to the person of the physician at the present moment.”1