Affect revisited: transference-countertransference and the unconscious dimensions of affective, felt and emotional experience

This article explores the concept of transference-countertransference which, it argues, holds out the promise of an inherently relational understanding of the unconscious dimensions of affective, felt and emotional experience. This argument is contrasted to Ian Burkitt’s multi-dimensional model of affect, feeling and emotion which rejects the notion that these have unconscious dimensions understood in psychoanalytic terms. The article suggests that there may be more grounds for dialogue between these approaches than meets the eye and that, as such, transference-countertransference may be a useful resource in the current putative ‘affective turn’.