The following articles are part of a continuing series on Perspectives on Psychoanalytic Education. The Editors welcome submissions from readers.
No single action by an institute faculty has a greater impact upon the total morale and functions of an institute than the appointment of training analysts. The training analysis is generally recognized as the cornerstone of psychoanalytic education and its effectiveness is of major significance for the candidate's ultimate capacity to understand and practice psychoanalysis. The training analyst serves as a reality-oriented professional role model as well as a stimulus for identification on the basis of possible unresolved transference reactions. The history of organized psychoanalysis is replete with illustrations of the role of the training analyst upon the function and dysfunction of psychoanalytic institutes.
In most institutes the training analyst is appointed for an indefinite length of time and no subsequent reevaluation of his performance is done. In spite of statements to the contrary, appointment as a training analyst takes on a hierarchical quality of ultimate psychoanalytic achievement; failure to be appointed a training analyst is seen as second-class status and a negative judgment by colleagues and peers. Most institute tensions leading to splits arise from the issue of who will train, and the power struggles between those who are already appointed training analysts and those who seek a greater role and participation in the training analytic function of the educational program. When splits do occur, there is a tendency for candidates and younger graduates to maintain allegiance to their own training analyst and his position, often on the basis of idealized and still unresolved transference reactions.
The qualities required for performance of the training analytic function are significantly different from those required for supervision, classroom teaching, administration, or scientific creativity. Because of this, the usual publicly recognized capacities of the potential training analyst may not suitably serve as criteria for the appointment. The chief criterion for a training analyst is clinical psychoanalytic skill and experience, as well as awareness of the special implications of the training analyst in the ultimate life and experience of the candidate whom he analyzes, and a recognition of how this may influence the analytic process.
Given the private nature of the clinical psychoanalytic situation, knowledge of the details of a colleague's sustained clinical skills is extremely difficult to obtain. The question then becomes how to make this important appointment in a way that removes it from political and group processes within the institute, and that allows appointment of those who are suitable, while arranging in as untraumatic a way as possible the refusal of appointment to those who are unqualified.
The St. Louis Psychoanalytic Institute has evolved a procedure of such appointments which I feel meets many of the issues described. Minimal eligibility involves five years of independent extensive clinical practice in psychoanalysis following graduation from an approved institute. Any individual who meets these requirements may initiate the evaluation process by applying to the Education Committee. The Education Committee itself may also nominate and inquire of eligible individuals whether they Wish to be considered.
The first step is the accumulation of confidential letters of evaluation from the individual's institute and specific analytic educators, as well as from current colleagues who know the individual's general work. The confidential file and documentation is forwarded to the Chairman of the Training Analyst Selection Committee of the Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute, and the prospective training analyst is then invited for a personal interview by a designated senior analyst member of that Committee.
This interview focuses in depth upon the personality of the potential training analyst, including inquiry into such areas as motivations to become a training analyst, understanding and thought about the training analyst's role, personal characteristics of integrity, capacity for self-analysis and recognition of countertransference, and general psychological and psychoanalytic fitness to function as a training analyst.
A report of this independent evaluation is made to the St. Louis Education Committee which then considers the consultant's opinion in the context of local knowledge regarding the potential training analyst's functioning, as well as the various letters of recommendation. If at this point the overall evaluation is negative, the individual is informed of this decision in as tactful a way as possible through personal interview with the Chairman of the Education Committee.
If the overall evaluation is positive, the prospective training analyst is invited to consult regularly on a monthly basis with a senior member of the Chicago Institute Training Analyst Selection Committee. This consultation involves presentation of clinical material from a patient currently in analysis, preferably a case as close as possible to the professional or personal characteristics of the usual psychoanalytic candidate. The distinction between consultation and supervision with the consulting analyst requires that the latter remain as much as possible an inquiring observer rather than an actively interpreting or teaching participant during these sessions.
After approximately 8 to 12 such consultative sessions, the consultant writes a summary report on his consultation to the St. Louis Education Committee including his overall as well as more detailed evaluation of the individual for the position of training analyst. The chief emphasis in these reports concerns the potential training analyst's clinical capacities, technique, understanding, and capacity for ongoing evaluation of his own psychoanalytic work. The report of the consultant in regard to these skills is evaluated by the St. Louis Education Committee in conjunction with the previously accumulated data, and a final decision is reached. The evaluation costs are paid to the consultants through the Chicago Institute Training Analyst Selection Committee on the basis of their regular hourly rate. Additionally, there are the costs of transportation. In most instances, the prospective training analyst bears these costs; but in cases of financial hardship, the St. Louis Institute shares in them.
The advantages of this system are that the prospective training analyst is carefully evaluated in the most private of his analytic functions by a senior respected and experienced colleague from another institute. The consultant has no particular personal or political motivations in the evaluation process, and hence can present the St. Louis Education Committee with a relatively objective assessment. This removes the evaluation process from the various personal or political tensions of the institute, and at the same time the clinical performance and capacities of the individual in question can remain relatively anonymous and confidential from his every day colleagues.
In this way “convoying” of potential training analysts is avoided, as is rejection based on personal or prejudicial considerations. In the event of a negative decision, the analyst in question need not further interact with the consultant, and intra-institute tension is thereby minimized. The analyst in question has minimal external realistic stimuli for feeling evaluated on grounds other than his own clinical capacities. And the most important function of a training analyst, his method of conduct of a psychoanalytic case, has been reasonably evaluated.
In view of the importance of these issues, the availability of consultants in other institutes, and the general ease of air transportation, I would suggest that this procedure warrants wide consideration by psychoanalytic educators.
Paul A. Dewald
St. Louis