Psychoanalytic training

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Psychoanalytic training is undertaken by those wishing to become psychoanalysts in order to be qualifed practioners in psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalytic training in the United States, in most locations, involves personal analytic treatment for the trainee, conducted confidentially, with no report to the Education Committee of the Analytic Training Institute; approximately 600 hours of class instruction, with a standard curriculum, over a four-year period. Classes are often a few hours per week, or for a full day or two every other weekend during the academic year; this varies with the institute; and supervision once per week, with a senior analyst, on each analytic treatment case the trainee has. The minimum number of cases varies between institutes, often two to four cases. Male and female cases are required. Supervision must go on for at least a few years on one or more cases. Supervision is done in the supervisor's office, where the trainee presents material from the analytic work that week, examines the unconscious conflicts with the supervisor, and learns, discusses, and is advised about technique.

Psychoanalytic Training Centers in the United States have been accredited by special committees of the American Psychoanalytic Association^[1] or the International Psychoanalytical Association. Because of theoretical differences, other independent institutes arose, usually founded by psychologists, who until 1987 were not permitted access to psychoanalytic training institutes of the American Psychoanalytic Association. Currently there are between seventy-five and one hundred independent institutes in the Unite States. As well, other institutes are affiliated to other organizations such as the American Academy of Psychoanalysis and Dynamic Psychiatry, and the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis. At most psychoanalytic institutes in the United States, qualifications for entry include a terminal degree in a mental health field, such as Ph.D., C.S.W., or M.D. A few institutes restrict applicants to those already holding an M.D. or Ph.D., and one institute in Southern California confers a Ph.D. or Psy.D. in psychoanalysis upon graduation, which involves completion of the necessary requirements for the state boards that confer that doctoral degree.

Some psychoanalytic training has been set up as a post-doctoral fellowship in university settings, such as at Duke University, Yale University, New York University, Adelphi University, and Columbia University. Other psychoanalytic institutes may not be directly associated with universities, but the faculty at those institutes usually hold contemporaneous faculty positions with psychology Ph.D. programs and/or with Medical School psychiatry residency programs.

The International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA) is the world's primary accrediting and regulatory body for psychoanalysis. Their mission is to assure the continued vigour and development of psychoanalysis for the benefit of psychoanalytic patients. It works in partnership with its 70 constituent organizations in 33 countries to support 11,500 members. In the US, there are 77 psychoanalytical organizations, institutes associations in the United States, which are spread across the states of America. The American Psychoanalytical Association (APSaA) has 38 affiliated societies, which are comprised of ten or more active members who practice in a given geographical area. The aims of the APSaA and other psychoanalytical organizations are: provide ongoing educational opportunities for it's members, stimulate the development and research of psychoanalysis, provide training and organize conferences. There are eight affiliated study groups in the USA (two of them are in Latin America). A study group is the first level of integration of a psychoanalytical body within the International Psychoanalytic Association (IPA), followed by a provisional society and finally a member society.

The Division of Psychoanalysis (39) of the American Psychological Association (APA) was established in the early 1980s by several psychologists, principal among them were Ruben Fine, Ph.D., Robert C. Lane.Ph.D., Max Rosenbaum, Ph.D. Nathan Stockhamer, Ph.D, Helen Block Lewis,Ph.D. and George Goldman, Ph.D. Until the establishment of the Division of Psychoanalysis, psychologists who had trained in independent institutes had no national organization. The Division of Psychoanalysis now has approximately 4,000 members and approximately thirty local chapters in the United States. The Division of Psychoanalysis holds two annual meetings/conferences and offers continuing education in theory, research and clinical technique, as do their affiliated local chapters. The European Psychoanalytical Federation (EPF) is the scientific organization that consolidates all European psychoanalytic societies. This organization is affiliated with the IPA. In 2002 there were approximately 3900 individual members in twenty-two countries, speaking eighteen different languages. There are also twenty-five psychoanalytic societies.

History of training

Psychoanalysis was limited to those "in the know" from the early 1920s (when A.A. Brill began the New York Psychoanalytic Institute) through the end of World War II, although the idea that repression of sexual urges could make you mentally ill (Freud's first, discarded theory) proved popular with college students in the 1920s – who used the theory to argue with their conservative parents. During those early years, Andrew Carnegie was perhaps one of the most famous patients who benefited; he later made his gratitude public by endowing a psychoanalytic fund in Pittsburgh.

Psychoanalysis became popular post-war, as many celebrities found it useful – such as Steve Allen, Jayne Meadows, and Art Buchwald. Psychoanalytic treatment became somewhat less popular during the 1980s and early 1990s. Circa 1986, when insurance companies decimated health insurance coverage for all mental illnesses people for whom psychoanalytic treatment was indicated were increasingly unable to afford it. Gradually, as psychiatry departments became more dependent on grants from pharmaceutical companies, chairs of Psychiatry Departments in the nation's medical schools tended to come from backgrounds involving pharmacological research – not from backgrounds involving analytic training. Interestingly, psychoanalytic institutes have experienced an increase in the number of applicants in recent years, but, not surprisingly, about 70-80% of incoming students are non-MDs.^[2]

Psychoanalytic training

History of training

See also

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