Concept
Complementary identification
In Racker's account of countertransference, the analyst's identification with one of the patient's internal objects, such as the patient's superego or a rejecting parent figure. Because the patient treats the analyst as that object, the analyst comes to feel treated as it and is drawn to act its part; Racker held that such identifications grow stronger as the analyst fails at or refuses concordant identification, and that recognising them shows what is happening in the transference.
- Broader concept
- Countertransference
- Introduced by
- Heinrich Racker
- Key works
- 1
introduced by
- Heinrich Racker 1957 Racker named the analyst's identification with the patient's internal objects 'complementary identification', adapting an expression of Helene Deutsch's. The analyst comes to feel treated as the object the patient projects onto him. He did so in 'The Meanings and Uses of Countertransference' (read 1953, published 1957).