In the current South African context there is a strong likelihood of the occurrence of trauma incidents that involve people of different races. Anecdotal evidence suggests that this has contributed to the increased expression of negative racial sentiments by victims of trauma, especially in crime related trauma, when the perpetrator/s are of a different race group to the victim. This research study locates itself within the small number of studies that have sought to engage with the problem of negative racial sentiments as a response to trauma. This study focused particularly on the observations, explanations and interventions of volunteer counsellors in having to engage with this content in traumatized clients. The study sought to understand the impact that the expression of negative racial sentiments had on the process of trauma counselling and debriefing and on counsellors personally. The research was operationalized within a hermeneutically oriented qualitative research framework. The participant group was comprised of 11 volunteer counsellors from different parts of Johannesburg and from different organizations. Participants were chosen through purposive sampling and face to face semi-structured interviews were used as the method of data collection. Thematic content analysis was employed to analyze the interview texts. The findings suggest that negative racial sentiments are a commonly occurring response following a trauma. Counsellors predominantly understand negative racial sentiments to be part of the trauma symptom pattern, in that they explain such responses as ‘trigger’ reactions. Counsellors also understood the sentiments to represent pre-existing prejudice, exaggerated and re-evoked by the trauma. The findings indicate that counsellors were developing and utilizing skills and interventions mainly of their own design in engaging with negative racial sentiments, as they are generally not trained on how to engage with this content in trauma counselling. Counsellors use interventions such as normalizing, psychoeducation and CBT based interventions when they do intervene, but in some cases make a choice not to intervene. Counsellors reported considerable discomfort and suggested that although case by case intervention was important, some guidance as to how to work in this area would be useful. The contextual nature of the problem and related interventions was also highlighted.

This study explored how psychodynamically oriented therapists understand and work with negative racial sentiments arising in traumatized clients. One of the aims of the study was to highlight and examine the technical, countertransferencial and ethical dilemmas faced when a patient brings ‘politically difficult’ material infused with negative racial sentiment to therapy. It was hoped that information gleaned would contribute to theoretical and technical understanding of this phenomenon and assist in working with such negative racial sentiments. In order to investigate the research questions eight therapists who identified themselves as ‘psychodynamically-oriented’ participated in semi-structured interviews on the topic of negative racial sentiment (NRS) in therapy. The study was located in the qualitative research tradition, and interview transcripts were subject to a critical thematic content analysis. The main themes were identified and presented under three sections, namely: how therapists understand, work with and respond to the phenomenon of NRS in traumatized clients. Understandings included the formation of NRS as inter alia reflecting the use of defenses such as splitting, projection, projective identification, the triumph of the bad object and a breakdown in the capacity to symbolize. Tensions in understanding the phenomenon of NRS post-trauma and related latent themes were also identified. Therapists’ approaches to working with NRS included the use of a range of implicit assessment criteria such as, whether, for example, the patient’s response was experienced as ego-dystonic or ego-syntonic. Technical strategies for intervention included adherence to a working model, interpretive interventions and cognitive strategies. The participating therapists’ countertransferential responses to negative racial sentiment were categorized, taking the form of: negative feeling towards or disidentification from the patient; negative feeling towards the perpetrator or identification with the patient and therapeutic impasse. Some guidelines proposed by the participating therapists for managing NRS, as it occurs in psychotherapy with traumatized clients, are presented.