Response to Sally Howard

Abstract

Continuing the discussion evoked the origins of “template theory,” which began with the observation that both patient and therapist have automatic relational behaviors. These relational reflexes, or “relational templates” (the outcome of repeated relational interactions), function as behavioral memories of how caregivers consistently responded to selfobject needs. This has clinical “in the session” applications, because it translates observed behavior into hypotheses about a patient's developmental history. Instead of seeing patients as engaging in transference distortions, it is understood that they are simply organizing relationships in the only way they know how. Difficult patients are not resistant but rather are reacting to an unfamiliar form of relatedness. Therapeutic action takes place in two ways. Firstly, through conversion from unspoken to spoken, a self-object experience called “naming and explaining,” and secondly, healthier relational interactions between patient and therapist eventually become new adaptive templates in the patient's interactive repertoire.