[The impact of perceptual stereotypes in indications for psychoanalysis]

Results of several experimental studies concerning the practice of selecting patients for psychoanalytic therapies are presented. The convergent findings strongly suggest that the indication for psychoanalytic therapies are heavily stereotyped and are dependent upon stimuli that do not result from communicative interaction with the patient. These facts are confronted with the psychoanalytic understanding of the role of countertransference during the indication process. Countertransference and stereotypes person perception do not necessarily contradict each other. It is proposed that countertransference reactions in this situation are partly a consequence of compatibility stereotypes vis á vis the patient which are quickly and unconsciously formed and which are afterwards differentiated and extended but also rationalized on a conscious level.