Relational Perspectives in Contemporary Psychoanalytic Theory (203B)

(formerly part of Psychoanalytic Models of the Mind Part 2)

Instructors: Heather Craige, MSW and Katherine Broadway, M.Div., LPC

This course has reached capacity and registration is closed except for PCC matriculated students

Relational approaches emphasize the ways in which early relationships shape the human mind and how the personalities of therapist and patient influence each other. Relational approaches shift our understanding and the ways we work with resistance, transference, countertransference, and therapeutic impasses. The relational literature is vast—we will focus on seminal articles by major contributors on attachment, mentalization, intersubjectivity, and self-states. Phenomena including “the analytic third,” enactment, dissociation, attachment style, pathological accommodation, and the role of self-disclosure will be considered. Students will be asked to hold in mind a “difficult to reach” client as we apply relational concept to working with developmental trauma.

This course is intended for clinicians at beginning through intermediate levels.

Prerequisite: Students will need a basic exposure to and understanding of psychoanalytic theory and its application to the treatment of patients. Applicants can meet this requirement through previous coursework, training, or supervision (e.g., Thinking Psychoanalytically: The Basics; the PPSC Introductory Course; psychoanalytic coursework or supervision in graduate school/residency or post-graduation). Applicants who don't meet this requirement can register for the course with permission of the instructor.

Register Here



Where:    all-Zoom course
When:     March 17 - May 5 or 12, 2020  (8 classes total)
Time:       7:10 - 8:40 pm
CME Credits: 12 / CE: 12 clock hours / NBCC: 12 clock hours / All others: Letter of Attendance

About the Instructors: Heather Craige, MSW and Katherine Broadway, M.Div., LPC 

Course Syllabus: click here

Registration and Tuition Deadline deadline is March 10. 
$25 Registration Fee is due at time of application.
Tuition: $315
$235 for students matriculated in the training programs 
$290 for residents and graduate students
Payment plans can be arranged with the Administrator
Matriculated students aren't charged a course registration fee.  Students who register for more than one course in a semester pay only one registration fee.  In special circumstances we may accept registrations after the registration deadline, but there will be an additional $20 late registration fee.
Course Cancellation Policy

Register Here

Course Learning Objectives: Upon completion, class participants will be able to:

1. Identify the hallmarks of the avoidant/dismissing, ambivalent/preoccupied, and disorganized/unresolved attachment styles.

2. Explain the relevance of attachment styles to the understanding of transference and defense in treatment.

3. Describe the difference between implicit and explicit memory and discuss the relevance of this distinction in treating developmental trauma.

4. Identify characteristics of good and faulty mentalization.

5. Describe how trauma produces dissociative phenomena and explain what is happening in the mind of a person who dissociates in terms of self-state theory.

6. Explain attachment and relational concepts into plain language that would be understandable to patients.

7. Discuss the meaning of the term enactment and how the therapist might view his/her own role in an enactment through a relational lens.

8. Describe the manifestations of “pathological accommodation” in light of attachment research.

CE & CME Information: