Transactional Analysis and Relationships - the Parent Adult Child model
We’ve all heard the phrase ‘you’re acting like a child.’ Often said when having a heated debate with a loved one.
This statement is said to imply that someone is behaving emotionally, or being stubborn in a way children often do. There is theory which relates to couples therapy and individual therapy that seeks to explore this idea of being in a state of mind of our own internal child and how this impacts us day-to-day.
Developed in the 1950s by Dr Eric Berne, Transactional Analysis (TA) is a concept which explores human behaviour and communication. It highlights that interactions in daily life, or “transactions” can be broken down and analysed to help improve both communication and relationships.
TA seeks to understand human personality through a theory of three ego states, which are ways in which a person thinks, feels, and behaves making up their personality at a given time. In TA, the states of feeling, thinking and behaving are:
Parent
Adult
Child
The Parent Ego State
‘Messages we’ve received’
The ego state known as the Parent refers to thoughts, feelings and behaviours that are copied, learned or even subconsciously borrowed from parents or parental figures.
Parental figures are not necessarily biological, but can be someone with power, influence or authority who had an impact during childhood. The messages received from these parental figures, can turn up like a third party in relationships and are often a focus in relationship counselling work to understand barriers to intimacy.
The Child Ego State
‘Experiences we’ve had’
The Child ego state is not when someone is acting childish, or even what others perceive as childish. It is usually how someone behaved, thought and felt, being replayed as it was when they were a child.
These are adaptive behaviours, developed as a way to keep us emotionally or even physically safe. These reaction are often automatic, linked to archaic memories we might not have words for. They let us know we might be feeling unsafe or our needs aren’t being met, unexplored this can create a barrier to growth and intimacy in the here and now.
The Adult Ego State
‘The here and now’
The ego state of the Adult operates in the present, or the here and now, and functions rationally applying appropriate emotion and thinking to what someone is feeling and experiencing. In simple terms, this is someone behaving without the influences of either the Parent or Child ego states. The work of therapy is often to “strengthen” the capacity of the Adult ego state.
The Parent Adult Child model
The Ego States in Daily Life
We all constantly shift between each of the three ego states and, therapy, whether it is couples therapy near me or individual therapy, aims to expand the capacity of the Adult ego state, which can be beneficial in times of stress. It allows someone to understand if their response to a situation is a reaction to what they think they should do, because it is how they were told is the right way to behave (the Parent), what they would have done based on prior experience (the Child) or to have a fuller engagement in the here and now (the Adult), so that someone can decide which behaviours and responses may serve them best in the moment.
Transactional Analysis and the work of Eric Berne gives a model for understanding how humans relate, how we transact from one ego state, as well as spotting the response in ourselves and in others. Understanding these states can be a step to a deeper understanding of the self, as well as the impact of others on the self, and vice versa.
If one half of a couple ‘transacts’ from the Adult, and the other person in the couple responds from their own Adult state, that is called an ‘Adult – Adult’ complementary transaction, as both are living in the here and now, rather than reacting from history or an assumption.
More on that next week, along with rules for communication and how to work with transactions in more detail.
Alex is a qualified Transactional Analysis psychotherapeutic counsellor who works with individuals and offers couples relationship counselling to explore emotional patterns, relationship dynamics, and the deeper roots of current struggles. He trained at the Metanoia Institute and is a registered member of BACP.
References
Berne, E. (1961) Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy. New York, Grove Press.