Participation cost: 50 NIS

The conversation in English

Dr. Otto Kernberg belongs to the generation of Nephilim who shaped psychoanalysis in the United States.

Kernberg's first contribution is the conceptualization of the level model of organization (neurotic, borderline, and psychotic), the development of understanding of borderline personality disorder in the context of this model, and the mapping of personality disorders according to their severity. Kernberg's remarkable ability to depict with such great precision the inner world of those suffering from severe personality disorders stands out for the many shades and complexities of their inner experience.

His second contribution was the development of transference-focused therapy, which initially focused on people with personality disorders and later expanded to treat a variety of distresses. According to Kernberg, patients with personality disorders are characterized by a diffuse identity and a lack of integration between self-representations and object representations. Through interpretation, the therapist helps to integrate the split and conflicting parts of the self and the object. The method has been empirically proven effective in treating patients with borderline personality disorder. Kernberg believes that interpretations should be given from a position of "technical neutrality."

In recent years, Kernberg has studied the phenomenon of leadership characterized by malignant narcissism within large groups.

In this conversation, Aner Guvrin and Sharon Ziv Beiman will talk with Otto Kernberg about:

What enables change in psychotherapy?

What are the key tools in transference-focused therapy?

How has transference-focused therapy changed throughout its development?

How has the integration movement and the changes that the world of psychotherapy has undergone affected TFP?

How does he define borderline personality disorder today, and has he changed his views in light of criticisms suggesting that complex trauma underlies the symptoms and dynamics identified with borderline personality disorder?

Has the understanding of the organizational levels model changed over the years?

What is the neutral position he recommends and how does he relate to the referential approach that emphasizes the therapist's subjectivity and its importance?

Can personality disorders be treated through online therapy?

How can the processes occurring in Western democracies be explained today according to the model he developed about large groups in regression and the malignant narcissism of leaders?

Otto Kernberg is a professor of psychiatry at Cornell University and former director of the Institute for Personality Disorders at Cornell Medical Center in New York City. He also served as president of the International Psychoanalytic Association from 1997 to 2001.

He has written dozens of books and articles dealing with personality disorders and transference-focused therapy. His latest book:

Hatred, Emptiness, and Hope: Transference-Focused Psychotherapy in Personality Disorders

Published in 2022, it examines the application of TFP in schizoid, psychotic conditions, sexual and love relationship disorders in patients suffering from narcissistic personality disorder, patients in psychiatric hospitals.

Frank Yeomans, MD, PhD is a Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Weill Medical School at Cornell University, Lecturer, Psychoanalytic Center at Columbia University , and President of the International Society for Transference-Focused Therapy.

His latest book:

Treating Pathological Narcissism with Transference-Focused Psychotherapy (co-written with Diana Diamond, Barry L. Stern, and Otto F. Kernberg) was published in 2021.