Transactional Analysis
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Transcript of Transactional Analysis
All about…Transactional Analysis
Includes Training & Workshop Materials
by: Kevin K. Dhillon (HRM)
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
…..“Every morning in Africa, a gazellewakes up, it knows it must outrun thefastest lion or it will be killed. Everymorning in Africa, a lion wakes up, itknows it must run faster than theslowest gazelle, or it will starve. Itdoesn't matter whether you're the lionor a gazelle-when the sun comes up,you'd better be running” Christopher
McDougallKevin Kulwant Dhillon
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
What is T.A? Developed by Eric Berne who believed that the majority of our life
experiences are recorded in our subconscious minds in an unaltered fashion and become a part of the way we behave
The behavior is subconsciously designed to get reactions and determine how others feel about us.
A method of dealing with behavioral disorders
Can be used to manage classroom behavior if we understand that children’s acceptable and unacceptable behavior is designed to ascertain how others feel about them
Meaning:
“Transactional Analysis is a theory of personality and a systematic
psychotherapy for personal growth and change”
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Introduction - I• Transactional analysis (TA) is a powerful tool to
bring about human well being.
• In an age when Emotional Quotient (EQ) has taken over Intelligence Quotient (IQ), Transactional Analysis (TA) is a tool to understand ourselves better and enrich our personality , to meet the demands that this ever-changing world
A transaction is an exchange of communication (verbal or non-verbal) between two people or within oneself.
An analysis of these transactions, gives us clues to our personality, and helps us change ourselves.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Introduction - IITransactional Analysis is a practical educational
psychology that offers a way of transforming educational philosophy and principles into everyday practice.
TA concepts provide a flexible and creative approach to understanding how people function and to the connections between human behavior, learning and education.
Teaching them to both teachers and students is a process of empowerment, enhancing effective methods of interaction and mutual recognition.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Introduction - III
Educational TA is both preventive and restorative. TA concepts are developed and used with people of all ages and stages of development in their various social settings.
The aim is to increase personal autonomy, to support people in developing their own personal and professional philosophies and to enable optimum psychological health and growth.
Transactional Analysis is a powerful tool in the hands of organizational development specialists through build a common strategy and build a functional relationship
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Continue:-
• It assists in understanding human behavior and ishelpful in motivating, counseling, interviewing- infact anywhere where communication plays animportant role.
• It is also a personality and psychotherapy forpersonal growth. It has wide applications in Clinical
Psychology, organizations and education.
• Books have been written for all ages, from childrenthrough to adults, by people all over the world.Transactional Analysis is truly an internationaltheory relating to a diverse range of cultures.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Area of Analysis
Structural Analysis: How personality is structured.
Functional Analysis – How to assess an individual’s personality
Transactional Analysis Proper: Analysis of what people do and say to each other.
Game Analysis: Analysis of ulterior transactions leading to a payoff
Script Analysis: Analysis of specific life dramas that people compulsively play out
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Fundamental Ideas of TA
Three Ego StatesParent Ego State Child Ego StateAdult Ego State
Four Life PositionsI’m not OK; you’re OKI’m not OK; you’re not OKI’m OK; you’re not OKI’m OK; you’re OK
Individuals need to feel adequateKevin Kulwant Dhillon
Assumptions of TAWe need physical and psychological “strokes”
We make current decisions based on past premises
Self-awareness is the first step in the change process
We are in charge of how we think, feel, and behave. Others do not make us think, feel and behave
People can change
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
TA outline• It is a theory of personality and a systematic
psychotherapy for personal growth and personal change.
• As a theory of personality, it describes how people are structured psychologically. It uses what is perhaps its best known model, the ego-state (Parent-Adult-Child) model to do this.
• The model makes us understand how people function and express themselves in their behaviors.
• As a theory of communication it extends to a method of analyzing systems and organizations.Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
• It offers a theory for child development, where it ties in very neatly with the Freudian developmental stages -oral, anal, phallic.
• It introduces the idea of a "Life (or Childhood) Script", that is, a story one perceives about ones own life, to answer questions such as
"What matters",
"How do I get along in life" and
"What kind of person am I".
This story, TA says, is often stuck to no matter the consequences, to "prove" one is right, even at the cost of pain, compulsion, self-defeating behavior and other dysfunction(wrong-action).
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Philosophy of TA
People are OKAY
People can THINK for themselves
People can MAKE DECISIONS for themselves
People can change decisions and
RE-DECIDE
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Key ideas of TATA emphasizes a pragmatic(practical)
approach, that is, it seeks to find "what works”
TA is primarily concerned with the following:
1. Analysis of Self Awareness
2. Ego States
3. Analysis of Transaction
4. Stroking
5. Analysis of Life PositionKevin Kulwant Dhillon
Workshop I Analysis of Self Awareness
1. Open Self 2. Blind Self
3. The Hidden Self 4. Unknown Self
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Johari Window (Joseph Luft & Harrington Ingham)
B. The Ego-State ( Parent-Adult-Child)PAC model
At any given time, there are three ego-states that people consistently use:1. Parent ("exterior-psychic"): a state in which people behave, feel, and think in response to an unconscious mimicking of how their parents (or other parental figures) acted, or how they interpreted their parent's actions.
- A huge collection of recordings in the brain of unquestioned or imposed external events perceived by a person in his early years
– Filled with values, injunctions, shoulds/oughts, good & bad– The individual feels, thinks, acts, talks, & responds just as
one of his parents did when he/she was little– Always functioning– Equivalent to Freud’s Superego
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Parent Ego State
Thoughts, feelings, attitudes, behavioral patterns based on messages or lessons learned from parents and other ‘parental’ or authoritarian sources
Should and should not; ought and ought not; always and never
Prejudicial views (not based on logic or facts) on things such as:
• religion dress salespeople• traditions work products• money raising children companies Nurturing views (sympathetic, caring views) Critical views (fault finding, judgmental,
condescending views)
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2. Adult ("neo-psychic"): a state in which people behave, feel, and think in response to what is going on in the "here-and-now," using all of their resources as an adult human being with many years of life experience to guide them.
This is the ideal ego state, and learning to strengthen the Adult is a goal of TA. While a person is in the Adult ego state, he/she is directed towards an objective appraisal of reality.– Most rational & reality-oriented– Principally concerned with transforming stimuli into
pieces of info & processing & filing that info on the basis of previous experience
– Reacts to stimuli as it is actually experienced– “A computer processing info without significant
basis”– Equivalent to ego
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Adult Ego State
Thoughts, feelings, attitudes, behavioral patterns based on objective analysis of information (data, facts)
Make decisions based on logic, computations, probabilities, etc. (not emotion)
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3. Child ("archaeo-psychic"): a state in which people revert to behaving, feeling and thinking similarly to how they did in childhood.
– The little boy or girl within us who feels, thinks, acts, talks, & responds just the way he/she did as a child at a certain age
– Equivalent to Id
When analyzing transactions we are really looking at the dialogue between ego states
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Child Ego State
Thoughts, feelings, attitudes, behavioral patterns based on child-like emotions, impulses, feelings we have experienced
Child-like examples
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Impulsive Pleasure seeking
Self - centred Rebellious
Angry Curious
Fearful Eager to please
Happy
Important Points regarding TA• There is no "universal" ego-state; each state is
individually and visibly manifested for each person.
• Ego states can become contaminated.
• Ego states also do not correspond directly to thinking, feeling, and judging, as these behaviors are present in every ego state.
• Berne suspected that Parent, Adult, and Child ego states might be tied to specific areas of the human brain; an idea that has not been proved.
• In more recent years the three ego state model has been questioned by a marginal TA group in Australia, who have devised a "two ego-state model" as a means of solving perceived theoretical problems:Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Transactions and Strokes• Transactions are the flow of communication, and more
specifically the unspoken psychological flow of communicationthat runs in parallel.
• Transactions occur simultaneously at both explicit andpsychological levels. Example: sweet caring voice with sarcasticintent(making fun or lightly taken up). To read the realcommunication requires both surface and non-verbal reading.
• Strokes are the recognition, attention or responsiveness thatone person gives another.
• Strokes can be positive or negative..• Transactions can be experienced as positive or negative
depending on the nature of the strokes within them. However,a negative transaction is preferred to no transaction at all,because of a fundamental hunger for strokes.
• The nature of transactions is important to understandingcommunication.
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Workshop IIExplore your Life Positions
The ok corral (Franklin ernst, 1971)
• I’m not OK – You’re OK (-,+)
• I’m Not OK – You’re Not OK (-,-)
• I’m OK – You’re not OK (+,-)
• I’m OK – You’re OK (+,+)–The most healthy life position
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Our Brain (According to Berne) Determines what we think and how we act
Acts like a tape recorder while recording
Events
Associated feelings
Has 3 distinct parts or ego states
Parent
Adult
Child
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Workshop IIIExplore your personality
• CP = CRITICAL PARENT
• NP = NURTURING PARENT
• A = ADULT
• NC = NATURAL CHILD
• LP = LITTLE PROFESSOR
• AC = ADAPTED CHILD
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Parent Ego State
• Everyone develops a Parent ego state when as children they absorb certain attitudes and ways of behaving from parental figures. When you feel, think, or act as you saw your parents (or other authority figures) act when you were little, you are in your Parent ego state.
Controlling Parent: ‘No body can leave until this report is furnished’
Nurturing Parent: ‘I am sorry you are not feeling well today. Would you like to go to see the doctor
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Continue (Parent Ego state):
• Sometimes parents treat their children in a loving way, speak to them, offer shelter and protection or take care of them in other ways. We call this nurturing behaviour. If it is nourishing, it helps children grow.
• While in your parent ego you may act either a controlling, sometimes critical way or in a nurturing, sometimes loving way.
• While in our parent ego we respond automatically almost as if a tape recording were playing in our heads and directing our words and actions
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The Adult Ego StateAlthough we respond automatically when in our
Parent, we respond analytically when in our Adult. Whenever you are gathering information, reasoning things out, estimating probabilities, and so on, you are in you Adult ego state. The Adult ego state has nothing to do with age, little children has Adult ego states too. For example when three years old Sean says: ‘I bet Kevin is home, I see his car’, he is using his Adult ego, since he estimates probabilities on the basis of facts
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
The Child Ego StateEven though you are an adult, you have a Child
inside you. While in your Child ego state, you feel and act like the little person you once were and includes the mental recordings of your:-
o Early experiences
o Reactions to these experiences, and
o Learned view of yourself and other people
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Cont: The Child ego stateJust as the Parent has different aspect, so does the
child. According to T.A. Theory, the child develops into three parts:-
1. Natural Child - NC
2. Little Professor - LP
3. Adapted Child - AC
The natural child (NC) is spontaneous, energetic, feeling curious, loving, uninhibited. It is the part of us that feels free and loves pleasure. When you are in your NC, you transact freely and openly.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Adapted Child - ACAC is developed when you learn to change (adapt)
your feelings and behaviour in response to the world around you. Learned feelings of guilt, fear, anxiety, depression and envy are characteristics of AC. The pride you feel when somebody praises you for good performance often comes from AC.
It is through adaptations that we originally become socialized – able to cooperate with others and live in groups. Through socialization we learn to take turns, to share, to be friendly, to be concerned about how something feels to others. We must learn these skills to get along socially. It is our AC which says ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to customers.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Cont: Adapted childHowever, AC can become the most troublesome part
of our personalities; it is the part that may feel not OK if we are:- frightened when we must speak; hurt when someone criticizes our doings, hurt when things don’t go our way at a meeting..
As a child you probably have learned to adapt in different ways, as a grown-up, you may still occasionally react the same way to a project deadline. From their AC, people often react to external demands by:- Complying, sulking, or avoiding situations.
Is the AC that may:- try to please everyone in its department; turn its back on people with problems; or procrastinate by putting off work until deadline passes Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
The little Professor - LPIs the ‘thinking’ part of the Child – thinking without
knowing all of the facts believed to be needed. It is creative, intuitive, and manipulative. With LP a child psyches out a situation and seems to have an inborn ability to:- dream up new ideas; ‘pull the right strings’ to reach desired goals; intuitive sense what to do as if by magic.
LP is able to:- come up with unusual concoctions; put familiar things together in new ways; imagine new ideas, products, solutions.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Cont: Little ProfessorLP ‘thinking’ can be free of rigid boundaries. For
example a four (4) years old Sean knew just the right tone of voice to use in saying things like; ‘I guess I’ll have to go to bed hungry tonight’, so that his parents quickly came up with cookies and a glass of milk. He also knew how to increase the probability of being served his favourite jam by dropping ‘subtle’ compliments like: Sean: ‘’Hey, Mom, do you know that I really don’t like this cookies?’’ Mom: ‘’What? You don’t like it?’’ Sean: ‘’No. I don’t like it. I love it’’.
Grown-ups have LP too. The LP figures out how to manipulate others. (Give example at work place)
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Analyzing of Transaction
Whenever people communicate, a transaction takes place between their ego states. They transaction may be classified as:-
Complementary or open – both people are operating from the same ego state (continuous and ongoing)
Crossed or blocked – the other person reacts from an unexpected ego state (closed off or diverted)
Ulterior or duplex– two ego states within the same person but one disguises the other (hidden or disguised)
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The process of analysis is simple – a diagrammatic representation of the ego states are used
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P Parent
C child
A adult
Open Transaction: When you send a direct message and get an expected response.
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P
CC
A A
P
There are following possible types of crossed interaction
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P
CC
A A
P
Big Little
CROSSED or BLOCKED if the person responds on a level other than the one on which he or she is addressed.
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P
CC
A A
P
Big Little
Big parent addresses Little child (“you always think you can get away with things,, but just wait..everyone gets what they
deserve in the end”), & Little’s adult responding in turn to Big’s adult (“my observation is that people don’t always get what they
observe”)
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P
CC
A A
P
Big Little
Ulterior or Duplex Transactions
Ulterior Transactions, like blocked transactions, are generally undesirable. An ulterior transaction happens when a person appears to be sending one kind of message but is secretly sending another. The real message is disguised.
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Data Exchange in Adult / Adult Transaction:1. What is the yearly salary for this job?2. It starts at USD 35,000.
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
Sympathetic Parent / Parent Transition:1. Those children really miss their father.2. Yes, let’s take them to the park for a little fun.
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
Playful Child / Child Transaction:1. I really like you.2. I like you too.
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
Child / Nurturing Parent Transaction:1. I’m so worried about my son I can’t concentrate on this report.2. You can leave work early to go by the hospital and see him.
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P
CC
A A
P1
2
1. Boss: What time is it?2. Secretary: You’re always in such a hurry!
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
1. Husband: Can you take the car to be serviced today?2. Wife: Today I iron. Sean expects a birthday cake. The dog has to go to the vet and now you want me to take the car in! Are you crazy?
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
1. Boss: I need 25 copies of this report for the board meeting this afternoon. Can you get them for me?2. Secretary: Aren’t you lucky you’ve got me around to take care of you?
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P
CC
A A
P
1
2
Scientist A:There may be some variables we haven’t considered for this experiment.
Scientist B:So what, who cares around here?
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P
CC
A A
P
A
B
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Injunctions and Drivers• TA identifies twelve key injunctions which people
commonly build into their scripts. These areinjunctions in the sense of being powerful "Ican't/mustn't ..." messages that embed into a child'sbelief and life-script:
• Don't be (don't exist), Don't be who you are, Don'tbe a child, Don't grow up, Don't make it in your life,Don't do anything!, Don't be important, Don'tbelong, Don't be close, Don't be well (don't besane!), Don't think, Don't feel.
• In addition there is the so-called episcript, "Youshould (or deserve to) have this happen in your life,so it doesn't have to happen to me." (Magicalthinking on the part of the parent(s).)
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• Against these, a child is often told otherthings he or she must do.
• There is debate as to whether there arefive or six of these 'drivers':
• Please (me/others)! Be perfect! Be Strong!Try Hard! Hurry Up! (Be Careful! isdisputed)
• Thus in creating his script, a child will oftenattempt to juggle these, example: "It'sokay for me to go on living (ignore don'texist) so long as I try hard".
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• This explains why some change is inordinately difficult.
• Driver behavior is also detectable at a very small scale, for instance in instinctive responses to certain situations where driver behavior is played out over five to twenty seconds.
• Broadly, scripts can fall into Tragic, Heroic or Banal (or Non-Winner) varieties, depending on their rules.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Ways of Time Structuring
There are six ways of structuring time by giving and receiving strokes:
1. Withdrawal
2. Ritual
3. Pastimes
4. Activity
5. Games
6. Intimacy
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1. WithdrawalThis means no strokes are being exchanged
2. RitualsA ritual is a series of transactions that are complementary
(reciprocal), stereotyped and based on social programming. Rituals usually comprise a series of strokes exchanged between two parties.
For instance, two people may have a daily two stroke ritual, where, the first time they meet each day, each one greets the other with a "Hi". Others may have a four stroke ritual, such as:
A: Hi!
B: Hi! How do you do?
A: Getting along. What about you?
B: Fine. See you around.Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
• The next time they meet in the day, they may not exchange any strokes at all, or may just acknowledge each other's presence with a curt nod.
Some phenomena associated with daily rituals:• If a person exchanges fewer strokes than
expected, the other person may feel that he is either preoccupied or acting high and mighty.
• If a person exchanges more strokes than expected, the other person might wonder whether he is trying to butter him up or get on good terms for some vested interests.
• If two people do not meet for a long time, a backlog of strokes gets built up, so that the next time they meet, they may exchange a large number of strokes to catch up.
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3. Pastimes• A pastime is a series of transactions that is complementary
(reciprocal), semi-ritualistic, and is mainly intended as a time-structuring activity. Pastimes have no covert purpose and can usually be carried out only between people on the same wavelength. They are usually shallow and harmless. Pastimes are a type of Smalltalk.
• Individuals often partake in similar pastimes throughout their entire life, as pastimes are generally very much linked to one's life script and the games that one often plays.
• Some pastimes can even be understood as a reward for playing a certain game. For example, Eric Berne in Games People Play discusses how those who play the "Alcoholic" game (which Berne differentiated from alcoholism and alcoholics) often enjoy the "Morning After" pastime in which participants share their most amusing or harrowing hangover stories.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Activities (Work)
• Activities in this context mean the individuals work together for a common goal. This may be work, sports or something similar. In contrast to Pastimes, there is a meaningful purpose guiding the interactions, while Pastimes are just about exchanging strokes. Strokes can then be given in the context of the cooperation. Thus the strokes are generally not personal, but related to the activity.
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Games and their analysisDefinition of gameA game is a series of transactions that is
complementary (reciprocal), ulterior, and proceeds towards a predictable outcome. Games are often characterized by a switch in roles of players towards the end. Games are usually played by Parent, Adult and Child ego states, and games usually have a fixed number of players; however, an individual's role can shift, and people can play multiple roles.
Berne identified dozens of games, noting that, regardless of when, where or by whom they were played, each game tended towards very similar structures in how many players or roles were involved, the rules of the game, and the game's goals. Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Each game has a payoff for those playing it, such as the aim of earning sympathy, satisfaction, vindication, or some other emotion that usually reinforces the life script. The antithesisof a game, that is, the way to break it, lies in discovering how to deprive the actors of their payoff.
Students of transactional analysis have discovered that people who are accustomed to a game are willing to play it even as a different "actor" from what they originally were.
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Analysis of a gameThree quantitative variables are often useful to
consider for games:
1. Flexibility: The ability of the players to change the currency of the game (that is, the tools they use to play it). In a flexible game, players may shift from words, to money, to parts of the body.
2. Tenacity: The persistence with which people play and stick to their games and their resistance to breaking it.
3. Intensity: Easy games are games played in a relaxed way. Hard games are games played in a tense and aggressive way. Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Based on the degree of acceptability and potential harm, games are classified as:
1.First Degree Games are socially acceptable in the players' social circle.
2.Second Degree Games are games that the players would like to conceal(hide), though they may not cause irreversible damage.
3.Third Degree Games are games that could lead to drastic harm to one or more of the parties concerned
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Contrast with rational (mathematical) games
• Transactional game analysis is fundamentally different from rational or mathematical game analysis in the following senses:
• The players do not always behave rationally in transactional analysis, but behave more like real people.
• Their motives are often ulteriorKevin Kulwant Dhillon
Some commonly found gamesHere are some of the most commonly found themes of
games described in Games People Play by Eric Berne:• YDYB: Why Don't You, Yes But. Historically, the first
game discovered.• IFWY: If It Weren't For You• WAHM: Why does this Always Happen to Me? (setting
up a self-fulfilling prophecy)• SWYMD: See What You Made Me Do• UGMIT: You Got Me Into This• LHIT: Look How Hard I've Tried• ITHY: I'm Only Trying to Help You• LYAHF: Let's You and Him Fight (staging a love triangle)• NIGYYSOB: Now I've got you, you son of a bitch• RAPO: A woman falsely cries 'rape' or threatens toKevin Kulwant Dhillon
Philosophy of TA• People are OK; thus each person has validity, importance, equality of
respect.• Everyone (with only few exceptions) has full adult capability to think.• People decide their story and destiny, and this is a decision that can
be changed.• Freedom from historical maladaptations embedded in the childhood
script is required in order to become free of inappropriate, inauthentic and displaced emotion which are not a fair and honest reflection of here-and-now life (such as echoes of childhood suffering, pity-me and other mind games, compulsive behaviour, and repetitive dysfunctional life patterns).
• TA is goal-oriented, not merely problem-oriented.• The aims of change under TA are autonomy (freedom from childhood
script), spontaneity, intimacy, problem solving as opposed to avoidance or passivity, cure as an ideal rather than merely 'making progress', learning new choices.
Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Kinds of transactionReciprocal or Complementary Transactions• A simple, reciprocal transaction occurs when both partners are
addressing the ego state the other is in. These are also called complementary transactions.
• Example 1• A: "Have you been able to write the report?"• B: "Yes - I'm about to email it to you." ----(This exchange was Adult to
Adult)• Example 2• A: "Would you like to skip this meeting and go watch a film with me
instead?"• B: "I'd love to - I don't want to work anymore, what should we go
see?" (This exchange was Child to Child)• Example 3• A: "You should have your room tidy by now!" (Parent to Child)• B: "Will you stop hassling me? I'll do it eventually!" (Child to Parent)• Communication like this can continue indefinitely. (Clearly it will stop
at some stage - but this psychologically balanced exchange of strokes can continue for some time).
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Crossed TransactionsCommunication failures are typically caused by a 'crossed transaction'
where partners address ego states other than that their partner is in. Consider the above examples jumbled up a bit.
• Example 1a:• A: "Have you been able to write that report?" (Adult to Adult)• B: "Will you stop hassling me? I'll do it eventually!" (Child to Parent)• is a crossed transaction likely to produce problems in the workplace.
"A" may respond with a Parent to Child transaction. For instance:• A: "If you don't change your attitude, you'll get fired."• Example 2a:• A: "Is your room tidy yet?" (Parent to Child)• B: "I'm just going to do it, actually." (Adult to Adult)• is a more positive crossed transaction. However there is the risk that
"A" will feel aggrieved that "B" is acting responsibly and not playing their role, and the conversation will develop into:
• A: "I can never trust you to do things!" (Parent to Child)• B: "Why don't you believe anything I say?" (Adult to Adult)• which can continue indefinitely.Kevin Kulwant Dhillon
Ulterior or Duplex or Covert transactions
• Another class of transaction is the ‘ulterior’ or 'duplex' or 'covert' transactions, where the explicit social conversation occurs in parallel with an implicit psychological transaction. For instance,
• A: "I need you to stay late at the office with me." (Adult words)
• body language indicates sexual intent (flirtatious Child)
• B: "Of course." (Adult response to Adult statement).
• winking or grinning (Child accepts the hidden motive).
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Phenomena behind the transactionsLife (or Childhood) Script• Script is a life plan, directed to a reward.• Script is decisional and responsive; i.e., decided
upon in childhood in response to perceptions of the world and as a means of living with and making sense of the world. It is not just thrust upon a person by external forces.
• Script is reinforced by parents (or other influential figures and experiences).
• Script is for the most part outside awareness• Script is how we navigate and what we look for, the
rest of reality is redefined (distorted) to match our filters.
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Redefining and Discounting• Redefining means the distortion of reality when we
deliberately (but unconsciously) distort things to match our preferred way of seeing the world. Thus a person whose script involves "struggling alone against a cold hard world" may redefine others' kindness, concluding that others are trying to get something by manipulation.
• Discounting means to take something as worth less than it is. Thus to give a substitute reaction which does not originate as a here-and-now Adult attempt to solve the actual problem, or to choose not to see evidence that would contradict one's script. Types of discount can also include: passivity (doing nothing), over-adaptation, agitation, incapacitation, anger and violence.
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