Mary Morgan

The British approach to working therapeutically with couples, often referred to as the Tavistock Approach, has its roots in Object Relations theory. An expanded version of Object Relations developed over many years, to take account not only of the intrapsychic world of each partner and the way they related to their objects, but of the interpersonal relationship and what the members of the couple create together.

New couple psychoanalytic concepts developed, such as the idea of a joint marital personality (Dicks) which describes the process of projective identification between a couple in which each unconsciously agrees to carry split off aspects of the other.  In Tavistock Relationships (originally named the Family Discussion Bureau) Enid Balint and colleagues took psychoanalytic concepts such as unconscious phantasy and explored how these manifested between the two members of the couple creating an inner world of shared unconscious phantasy and shared defences.

The influence of earlier unresolved aspects of relating on the present relationship is considered important and whether the current relationship can be therapeutic in the process of working through. Can the relationship be helped to function as a psychological container (Colman)? The psychic developments that can potentially occur through the therapeutic relationship, such the internalisation of a couple state of mind, and the capacity for creative couple functioning is also considered (Morgan). Alternatively, the very defensive and destructive functioning of some relationships is seen, for example in the creation of very rigid projective systems, or in different kinds of narcissistic relating created to manage the problem of difference, separateness and otherness. A fuller account of the theoretical framework can be found in the references below.

The therapeutic approach usually consists of a once weekly session, over a period of one to three or more years. The regularity of the sessions is considered important in creating a safe and containing environment for the couple and one in which deeper anxieties can emerge and be contained.  Attention is given to the couple’s transference relationship, both between the members of the couple and directed to the therapist. A couple state of mind is the basic therapeutic stance both as an anchor for the therapist in working through the countertransference to help in understanding what is occurring between the members of the couple and leading to the development of a couple interpretations.

References

Clulow, C. (2009) (Ed) Sex, Attachment and Couple Psychotherapy: Psychoanalytic Perspectives (pp. 75–101). London: Karnac.

Dicks, H. V. (1967). Marital Tensions. Clinical Studies towards a Psychological Theory of Interaction. London: Karnac. (Reprinted 1993.)

Fisher, J. (1999). The Uninvited Guest. Emerging from Narcissism towards Marriage. London: Karnac.

Grier, F. (Ed.) (2005a). Oedipus and the Couple. London: Karnac.

Morgan, M. (2019) A couple state of mind: psychoanalysis of couples and the Tavistock Relationships Model. London & New York: Routledge.

Morgan, M. (2010). Unconscious beliefs about being a couple. fort da, 16 (1): 36–55. Reprinted (2017) in S. Nathans & M. Schaefer (Eds.), Couples on the Couch. Psychoanalytic Couple Therapy and the Tavistock Model (pp. 62–81). Abingdon & New York: Routledge.

Ruszczynski, S. (Ed.) (1993). Psychotherapy with Couples: Theory and Practice at the Tavistock Institute of Marital Studies. London: Karnac.

Ruszczynski, S. & Fisher, J. V. (Eds.) (1995). Intrusiveness and Intimacy in the Couple. London: Karnac.

Scharff, D. E. & Savege Scharff, J. (2014). Psychoanalytic Couple Therapy: Foundations of Theory and Practice. London: Karnac.