The effect of transfer in psychology is an unconscious projection by a person of emotions, feelings and thoughts that he has previously experienced on an object to which they do not belong. The first time this phenomenon was recorded by Sigmund Freud in 1905.
Initial value
Curious is the fact that initially the scientist considered the transfer in psychology an obstacle to psychotherapeutic work. However, exploring the phenomenon further, he concluded that, on the contrary, it helps to better understand the patient. It is important to remember that not all reactions are considered transference in psychology - some of them really correspond to the situations that are currently unfolding. In addition, countertransference is possible - when the interlocutor also starts to project in response to the projection.
Features
By the examples of transference in psychology from life it is noticeable that a person constantly reproduces emotions, relationships that he has already experienced. In everyday life, this is manifested in the fact that a person accustomed to custody, for example, begins to search for the second half, which will give him it. The transfer in psychology is, for example, the features of building the social interaction of a particular person.
Sometimes there are projections of one's own act, which a person ascribes to other persons. For many, this is how psychological protection manifests itself. Thus, the transference effect in psychology of this type is illustrated by the following life example: a traitor husband, with particular zeal, accuses his wife of treason.
Or the boss, who was mistaken in something, will surely blame the lower-ranking employee, exposing everything as if he himself are sincerely surprised by what is happening. A person can believe his projections, or he can do so consciously.
Signs
One of the most striking features by which transference is recognized is the inappropriateness of the reaction. This is an indicator that the reaction was caused not by current events, but by certain objects of the past.
In addition, the presence of a projection indicates the intensity of any human reaction. It is important to consider that the transfer is intermittent, "floating". The persistence of reactions and the lack of spontaneity also indicate the fact that a person is currently projecting, and not in the current moment. Very often, the transfer is associated with internal aggression.
Transfer Types
The transfer in psychology can extend to emotions, and feelings, and thoughts. In the latter case, the patient begins to think of a partner. But most often, the transfer in psychology is expressed in the projection of action. So, a person who has experienced something unpleasant and painful, seeks to put everything in such a way that someone from the surrounding experience the same.
It is noteworthy that transference and countertransference in psychology begin to be fixed from the early years of a person's life. So, a child punished by a slap on the pope from the parents can kick the younger brother in retaliation, a toy. He cannot give back to his parents and addresses his aggression to an accessible object. In adulthood, human actions acquire particular sophistication.
About the phenomenon in everyday life
In life there are a lot of examples of projections and transfers in psychology. So, when a person says phrases: “Someday life will shake you so much that it won’t seem enough ...”, “When you’re in my place ...” is a sign that the speaker is not coping with his own feelings and character. Few people carefully approach their projections, wondering how to get rid of transference in psychology. And such statements flood everyday communication.
People prefer to hide the accumulated grievances, dissatisfaction and tear them to others. And if, understanding what transfer is in psychology, how to work it out, a person does not think about it - this is a sign of a weakness of character. Often, even the closest people consciously or unconsciously strive to do something bad. For example, saying: “Do not think that someone needs you there, they will cut them, you will see”, “Your mother has an early gray hair, and you will also,” someone may “hopefully” with compassion from relatives. Or, for example, the rejected man says: “After years, your husband will leave you and you will remember me, but I will reject you.”
The transfer of feelings in psychology is not always always voiced - very often such a phenomenon occurs in the thoughts of people who they never express.
About antidotes
Is there an antidote to such projections, words? Of course there is. If there are problems with this, then you need to develop in yourself resistance to such words. Project them onto yourself consciously and on purpose. This will develop immunity, and the words will cease to mean anything to the person.
It makes no sense to point out the projecting person to his behavior, it will be in vain. People react stereotyped: they become embittered, display aggression, while blaming the interlocutor directly for aggression. The mechanism starts again - this time a new transfer. You need to work and it makes sense only with yourself, and not with others.
About polarization
It is important to note that projections come with both positive polarization and negative. The latter is manifested, for example, in cases where a girl who, from childhood, observed a depressing home environment with abuse, violence and a bad attitude of her father towards her mother, decides that "probably all men are like that."
There is also a neutral projection. So, a man will look for a woman who will remind him of his mother. Or a woman will look for a husband with whom she will feel safe - this is a transfer of the archetype of her father. The girl, who first experienced deep feelings for a young man with a certain type, will subsequently subconsciously choose partners with the same features. The same may occur in men. Similar examples indicate projections of images on other people.
Sometimes the transfer is positive, highlighting the best qualities of a person. For example, a man who has lost his parents or quarreled with them will transfer all love and care to a woman. Sometimes a lonely person transfers care to a kitten. But this is the only possible positive shift.
The connection of time and fantasy
Sometimes projections show the connection of times - already as an adult, a man can continue to love his toy “soldiers” and, when no one sees him, play them. Sometimes a woman feels the need to buy dolls. Sometimes habits are transferred from childhood - to pout lips, for example.
There is a transfer in fantasies. So, the partner will transfer the sexual fantasy from the pornographic film to a real person. Sometimes a person who has his own ideas about an idol transfers them to a partner.
Conscious transfer
Almost any person expresses their projections in life. They are very persistent. They are used and quite deliberately - for example, wanting to create a situation, to commit manipulation. How to remove transference in psychology? If a person asks such a question, you need to know that there are techniques for this.
According to Jung, the psychology of transference is an overgrown consciousness that is stuck at a certain level. When relationships are based on projections, they lose sincerity and depth. They can be long, but not durable. They will rather oppress the psyche than help to feel the presence of a family. Most often, the transfer effect is exhibited by ambitious individuals, neurotics, or persons prone to adventures.
At psychotherapists
It is important to consider that transference extends fully to psychoanalytic practice. So, the client’s past emotional experience unfolds before his eyes in his relationship with the therapist.
If in life a bitter boss can cause stress in advance, expecting elevated tones from him, even when it is unusual for him, but his father once reacted like this, then this will also appear in counseling. A projection occurs, and the person, in fact, communicates not in the current situation, but with the new guise of his father.
When the therapist is attentive to the patient during the consultation, the latter may think that the therapist is one of the most significant people in his inner world. And then the quiet silence of the therapist begins to be perceived as the anger that parents could show in the same situations, depression. And the patient resorts to the usual form of behavior.
At the same time, the therapist is also involved in this game if he has experiences in the same field. And countertransference begins - the therapist plays along with the patient.
Projections make it possible to reveal what the client’s past was and to understand how the early experience in relations with parents manifests itself in the present moment. The consultant has every opportunity to demonstrate to the client how his transfers work, so that the latter gets rid of his past injuries and outdated fantasies that he carries everywhere.
A catalyst for triggering a transfer can be any detail of objective reality. Both communication participants form ideas about the interlocutor in appearance, character, habits, and environment. And there are both realistic images in perception, and irrational.
Allocate and narcissistic transfer. People with narcissism tend to use a consultant as an object of the Self. They begin to idealize him, as he performs a supporting function, and instantly depreciate him when he refuses to perform such functions. A number of people feel the need for admiration from others. And when they implement this in a relationship with a consultant, they feel complete unity with the psychoanalyst.
Sometimes a person transfers the emotional worldview that was characteristic of him in previous interpersonal relationships to an actual partner - for example, depressed moods, fantasies about greatness, and a sense of rage. Projections of this type show a need for proximity and security.
Additional views
Displacement is one type of transference. This phenomenon is a protective mechanism when negative emotions are transferred to an object that has nothing to do with the past situation. As a rule, we are talking about those on whom it is easy to throw out negative emotions - meek people who do not have the strength to besiege others.
Projections appear when a person is often reproached, humiliated by leaders, and he begins to splash out the same with respect to obedient objects. Objects may be lower on the ladder of the social hierarchy, be weaker than the one who projects.
There is another kind of projection - substitution. In this case, desire objects are replaced. So, when a person loses an object dear to his heart - for example, a beloved animal dies, a divorce occurs, he seeks to find ways to live the ghostly memory of his love. It is more difficult in this case to stop loving.
Another type of projection is care. It manifests itself in avoiding all kinds of actions that would bring discomfort and trouble.
Also, there are "second-hand experiences." This happens when a person does not find the opportunity to exert his strength in a real life situation. She begins to transfer experiences to substitute objects that are associated with real desires - books, films, games. It is necessary to realize what is happening, to get away from this process and to meet the available facts face to face.
There is also an auto-projection, which is distinguished by the Chinese scientist Wang Fei. This is manifested in the transfer to a specific organ in the body of a neurotic disorder, which, in his opinion, leads to psychosomatic diseases.
About the subject of projection
It is important to consider that anything can become a projection subject. The entire content of the unconscious tends to manifest itself in projections. There is even a rule according to which the inner essence of a person manifests itself in projections. Any internal archetypes manifest themselves in projections on external situations, on surrounding animals, on circumstances, even on objects.
A person always understands other people as he understands or tries to understand himself. And that which he does not understand in himself, does not understand in others. It is arranged that a person is often subjective. And no intimacy gives guarantees for objectivity.
It is a common habit to shift responsibility for problems in any relationship to other people instead of looking for reasons in oneself.
When a person actively condemns someone, he thereby shames some unconscious piece in himself - which projected onto the object that made him angry. In making judgments about other people, a person reveals his own defects. The person blames those around him for his own mistakes, which he does not recognize. The more emotions a person causes in one or another phenomenon in the surrounding reality, the more it is worth paying attention here: there is his own projection, a problem place. It is very likely that the phenomenon is in reality not so significant, but thanks to its projection, a person gives it incredible features, reproducing again and again his experience from the past, as well as the emotional experiences experienced then.