Student journey · Transactional Analysis
Who is speaking in you?
Ego states explained in two ways: first as Eric Berne formulated them, then as we use them here, in day-to-day practice.
Interactive reading, about 15 minutes. Tap the circles, move the bars and answer the exercise.
Healthy circles only touch.
First part
How Berne explained it
Eric Berne introduced ego states in 1957, in a paper on the clinical use of the concept, and systematized them in 1961 in Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy. Each person carries three coherent systems of thinking, feeling and behavior, which he called ego states: Parent, Adult and Child (Berne, 1957, 1961). They are the foundation of all transactional analysis, and this is the classic version.
Three circles, three psychological realities
Capitalized, Parent, Adult and Child are ego states. In lowercase, parent, adult and child are real people. Your mother, a person, can speak from any of the three states.
Ego states are not roles one puts on: they are lived realities. Berne insisted that Parent, Adult and Child are observable phenomena, not theoretical constructs, and Clarkson and Gilbert (1988) uphold that reading: each state is a complete existential experience, available throughout life, including to be relived with the emotions of that time.
Inside and out: structural and functional
It shows where each state comes from. What is the context of the behavior? What past experiences and perceptions lie behind the actions? It is the map of the three circles.
It observes how the state shows itself now. Which state directs feelings, thoughts and actions in the here and now, and what can be seen from the outside? It is the map we use most in everyday life.
The descriptive aspects: Berne’s diagram
In functional analysis, Berne (1961) describes each state by its descriptive aspects. This is his diagram: the Parent divides into Natural and Critical, and the Child into Natural, Adapted and Rebellious. Tap each part to see what it describes and how it appears in the names we use on this site.
How do we know who is speaking? The diagnoses
For Berne (1961), the diagnosis of an ego state begins with a hypothesis, drawn from observing behavior, and is verified by four methods. Tony White (2011) proposed a fifth, the contextual one.
The energy of the states: cathexis
The potential energy stored in a state, not yet in action.
Voluntary activation: the person chooses to bring a state onto the stage.
Involuntary release, triggered by an external stimulus or an internal dialogue.
The state in which the sum of free and unbound cathexis is greatest holds the executive power: it is the one in charge of behavior at that moment (Berne, 1961). That is the starting point for understanding contamination, which you will see in the second part.
Second part
The version we use here
In TA 101 and in the Lab’s tools we use the functional model. It divides the Parent and the Child into parts that can be observed from the outside, which is why it serves recognition, the egogram and everyday conversations. The division of the Parent into Critical and Nurturing and of the Child into Natural and Adapted goes back to Berne (1961, 1964) and was consolidated by Dusay (1972) and Stewart and Joines (1987). In Brazil, Rosa Krausz presents the seven functional states in Trabalhabilidade (1999), applied to the world of work, and that is the version the TA 101 handbook (Instituto MIR, 2025) adopts.
The functional map: seven states
Tap a circle to open it, then one of the parts.
| Neste site | Na formulação clássica de Berne |
|---|---|
| Pai Crítico (PC) | Pai Crítico, Controlador ou Estruturante |
| Pai Protetor (PP) | Pai Natural ou Nutridor |
| Adulto (A) | Adulto |
| Criança Livre (CL) | Criança Natural |
| Pequeno Professor (PProf) | Pequeno Professor, o Adulto dentro da Criança |
| Criança Adaptada Submissa (CAS) e Rebelde (CAR) | Criança Adaptada e a sua variação, a Criança Rebelde |
The egogram and the constancy hypothesis
Created by John Dusay (1972), the egogram shows how much energy a person invests in each functional state. By the constancy hypothesis, (P + A + C) · mm = K: the sum is fixed, so when one state grows, another shrinks. Move a bar and watch the others adjust.
When the map jams: exclusion and contamination
In healthy functioning the three circles touch without invading one another. Berne (1961) described two boundary problems: exclusion, when a state is kept out of use, and contamination, when the Parent or the Child intrudes on the Adult. See each case in the diagram.
Train your eye
Who is speaking in each sentence? Remember: the same sentence can come from different states, depending on tone, gesture and context. Here, imagine the most natural tone.
Now, in practice
Take the map into life.
Berne, E. (1957). Ego states in psychotherapy. American Journal of Psychotherapy, 11(2), 293–309. · Berne, E. (1961). Transactional analysis in psychotherapy: A systematic individual and social psychiatry. Grove Press. · Berne, E. (1964). Games people play: The psychology of human relationships. Grove Press. · Berne, E. (1972). What do you say after you say hello? The psychology of human destiny. Grove Press. · Clarkson, P., & Gilbert, M. (1988). Berne’s original model of ego states: Some theoretical considerations. Transactional Analysis Journal, 18(1), 20–29. · Dusay, J. M. (1972). Egograms and the “constancy hypothesis”. Transactional Analysis Journal, 2(3), 37–41. · Instituto MIR. (2025). Apostila AT 101 (version 7). · Krausz, R. R. (1999). Trabalhabilidade [Workability]. Nobel. · Stewart, I., & Joines, V. (1987). TA today: A new introduction to transactional analysis. Lifespace. · White, T. (2011, July 25). The contextual diagnosis of ego states. Graffiti.