Eric Berne (1910-1970)

Professional Life
Eric Berne was born Eric Lennard Bernstein on Mary 10, 1910. He was born in Montreal, Canada to a writer and a physician. His father died when he was young, and he was raised by his mother. He studied medicine at McGill University, and received his degree in 1931. He entered a residency at Yale, where he studied psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Berne became nationalized in 1939 and later changed his name from Bernstein to Berne, but often used pseudonyms for his professional articles. Berne served in the army briefly during World War II, and continued studying upon his release. One of his teachers was Erik Erikson, and he worked with him as he practiced at Mt. Zion Hospital. Berne worked at several hospitals throughout the San Francisco area and continued his study of psychoanalysis as he practiced as a group therapist. His views began to conflict with traditional psychoanalytic theories, and he was recognized as being separate from the community when he was refused entrance into the San Francisco Psychoanalytic Institute in 1949. Berne began exploring intuition and eventually created the theory of Transactional Analysis. Berne was married three times, each time ending in divorce. He died in 1970 from a heart attack.

Contribution to Psychology
Berne examined the interactions between the three ego-states of parent, adult, and child. He categorized the patterns of these interactions as games and termed the interpersonal interactions as transactions. He conducted a seminar group during the 1950’s and the name Transactional Analysis (TA) was used to describe his work. Over the next fifteen years, his work expanded and the Transactional Analysis Association was created, although his ideas are still considered unconventional. At the same time, Berne wrote Games People Play, which catapulted Berne into the spotlight. The book explained the patterns of games that people play, and Berne used creative and descriptive titles to capture the reader’s attention. His description of winners as white and victims as black became part of the American vocabulary.

Transactional Analysis is used across many sectors, including educational, business, personal, and organizational. In educational models, Transactional Analysis has been shown to improve self-esteem, student motivation, teacher retention, and parent involvement and understanding, behavior management, staff and student morale, and the educational culture. In an organizational setting, Transactional Analysis helps create and develop functional behaviors and relationships and transforms dysfunctional actions to create a cohesive and productive environment.

Quote by Eric Berne