On an Ethic of Psychoanalytic Technique

Abstract

The puristic aspect of the classical triad of technique--abstinence, anonymity, and neutrality--is evaluated vis-à-vis the influence of the patient's and the analyst's value systems on the psychoanalytic transaction. In the last decade an increasingly different valuation of affects, regression, and enactment has changed the meaning of this technical triad. Re-evaluation of enactment in the countertransference has been particularly striking in calling for a re-evaluation of our ethic of technique, resulting in the construction of seven other qualities to be added to the classical technical triad.