Analysing the matrix of transference

In this paper, the background experiential states forming the matrix of transference are discussed in terms of the interplay of three modes of generating experience: the autistic-contiguous, the paranoid-schizoid and the depressive. Portions of three analyses are discussed in an effort to illustrate clinically some of the ways in which analytic technique is shaped by an understanding of the predominant mode or modes of experience forming the context of the transference-countertransference at any given moment. There is a focus on the ways in which the analyst's interventions must often be directed to the contextual level, or matrix, of transference (for example, the significance of the way the patient is thinking, talking or behaving) before it becomes possible to address other interrelated aspects of transference (for example, the unconscious symbolic meanings of what the patient is thinking, saying or enacting).