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The training analysis concept assumes that training analysts (TAs) can more effectively treat analyst-patients than non-TAs can. This study tests this assumption empirically by comparing satisfaction with analytic treatment by a TA with that by a non-TA in the same analyst-patients. Extensive literature critical of training analysis led us to hypothesize that analysis of analyst-patients by TAs would actually be less satisfactory than personal analysis by a non-TA. The validity of the analyst's questionnaire ratings of satisfaction was supported by independent ratings
This article was published Online First March 17, 2014.
Joseph Schachter, MD, Columbia University Psychoanalytic Center for Training and Research and Pittsburgh Psychoanalytic Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Bernard Gorman, PhD, Nassau Community College of the State University of New York and Hofstra University; Friedemann Pfäfflin, MD, Private Practice, Ulm, Germany, and Psychoanalytic Institute, Ulm, Germany; Horst Kächele, MD, International Psychoanalytic University, Berlin, Germany.
Funded by a research grant (#140323) from the International Psychoanalytic Association to Joseph Schachter. We would like to express our appreciation to Judith S. Schachter, MD, and Richard C. Friedman, MD, for their thoughtful comments and editorial suggestions.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Joseph Schachter, MD, 160 West 66th Street, New York, NY 10023. E-mail:
by 2 senior analysts of transcribed individual interviews of participants. It correlated significantly with participants' questionnaire ratings of satisfaction. Theoretically, treatment by TAs should be more satisfactory than treatment by non-TAs. This study, however, found no significant difference between satisfaction with analytic treatment by a TA compared with treatment by a non-TA. This same lack of difference in satisfaction had been reported in a previous unrelated clinical interview study. In addition, there was no difference between TAs and non-TAs in the proportion of analysts who reached a mutually agreed termination and no difference in treatment duration. Because no study has reported that treatment by a TA is more satisfactory than treatment by a non-TA, the burden of proof falls on those psychoanalytic organizations who utilize a TA conception to demonstrate that treatment by a TA is more satisfactory.