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In this paper I propose to examine some general and some specific assumptions about transcultural factors, their importance and impact in the development and vicissitudes of transference and countertransference, as well as how they affect approaches and outcome in psychoanalysis as therapy between patients and psychoanalysts of differing cultures.
My primary focus will be on psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, as conceived and conducted in the United States by psychoanalysts or psychotherapists identifying with the Western world, with patients representing a significantly different culture. To the extent that such patients are psychoanalytic trainees from a different culture, called upon to treat patients in the United States, and who subsequently return to their native countries and work with patients there, additional factors will be considered. For patients or psychoanalysts presumably assimilated or those who seem to have been absorbed within North American culture or society, as compared to those who remain identified with their original culture and/or community and may be likely to return to it, similarities and differences need be kept in mind.
Patients of socioeconomic groups not usually readily amenable or available to most psychoanalysts' practices will not be included in this presentation, although they may provide a background for better understanding because of the availability of studies on those groups. This could also apply to minority groups within the North American culture.