Essentials of psychoanalytic-interactional method

Psychoanalytic-interactional therapy (PIM) was derived from analytic psychotherapy on account of broad clinical experiences specifically to allow for the treatment of patients suffering from severe developmental disorders of the personality (structural disorders). The experiences with dysfunctional relationships of these patients come to the fore mainly as implicit relational knowing and therefore cannot be affected by interpretations. The psychoanalytic-interactional method requires among others the therapist to be involved into direct interaction with the patient. The paper describes the main features of the method in the dyadic and in the group setting.