Unconscious transference is a memory error that occurs when an eyewitness to a crime misidentifies a familiar but innocent person from a police lineup. Historically, the use of the term unconscious refers to the idea that the witness who misidentifies the familiar foil (an innocent person in a police lineup) has no conscious recollection of
The concepts of transference and countertransference, together with that of transference neurosis, properly belong to the theory and practice of psychoanalysis. In Sigmund Freud’s original formulations they were inextricably intertwined with his propositions about the determinants of development and neuroses, and they have very limited meaning outside that framework. Where they are so used, their