The Technique of Supervised Analysis1

In the 1955 panel on "The Technique of Supervised Analysis, " the discussion was oriented toward the problems of the student with his first patient. Concrete technical problems of supervision were considered extensively, but countertransference dominated the discussion, since some regarded it as one of the most significant and important technical problems. Granted that the main purpose of supervision is to teach the candidate, two basic issues are involved, namely, (1) to what extent is the supervisory process a means of acquiring experience in psychoanalytic technique, recognizing transference and analyzing the defenses on the part of the beginner; and (2) to what extent does it involve recognition and the resolution of the candidate's personal problems? This was based on a remark made by Freud in 1910 to the effect that all is not emotion, but that experience is also important.

With this in mind the present panel was designed to discuss the problems of supervision and countertransference. The chairman, Emanuel Windholz, made it clear that where differences of opinion existed, they could best be understood if clinical examples were presented. He therefore asked the participants to be prepared to discuss actual case material, assuring them that anonymity would be preserved.

The chairman drew attention to the fact that the recent interest in the problems of the analyst's countertransference had raised our hopes of improving the training of candidates. He expressed a cautionary note, however, that, as with so many "new" approaches, we frequently find that they have been applied before, and that it may take time to prove whether there is much in them that is "new." The main question is: how far can the supervisor, who is not the candidate's training analyst, help the candidate with his personal problems, in so far as they interfere with his efforts to analyze a patient? This question is intimately connected with another one, namely, the total problem of the teac