Abstract : Therapists reported frequencies of experiencing 24 instances of feeling anger, hate, fear, and sexual attraction or arousal; encountering 16 client events e. Responses differed according to therapist gender e. Many participants rated graduate training regarding anger, fear, and sexual arousal as inadequate.
The American Psychological Association owns the copyright. Certain feelings--anger, hate, fear, and sexual attraction or arousal--may make many therapists uncomfortable, have been largely neglected in the research literature, and may not be adequately addressed in graduate training programs.
The purpose of this article is to focus attention on these feelings and to present some relevant empirical data. Although the early analytic view of countertransference encouraged exploration of the therapist's uncomfortable, negative, or taboo feelings, Winnicott pioneered the frank acknowledgment of a therapist's anger at and hatred of a patient.
Illustrating his themes with what must have been difficult, perhaps courageous self-disclosures, he wrote that therapists "must not deny hate that really exists" p. The denial of hate led to "therapy that is adapted to the needs of the therapist rather than to the needs of the patient" Winnicott, , p.
Subsequent writers have explored the distinct but often interrelated feelings of anger and hate as they emerge with regard to such issues as child sex abuse e. The writings have tended to focus on three distinct themes. First, therapists may find it exceptionally difficult to acknowledge these feelings. As Boccellari and Dilley emphasized in their discussion of helping people who suffer from AIDS, "Negative or ambivalent feelings towards the patient, such as anger and resentment, can be particularly difficult for the caregiver to admit.
