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Transactional
Social exchanges between individuals. The most ideal transactional communications are give-and-take interactions in which an individual is confident about self-expression although open to the opinions and personal history of the other. The literature on transactional communication spans many fields, including psychology, management, and education.
The term transactional came into the vernacular during the second half of the 20th century with the psychiatrist Eric Berne's conception of how parental behaviors shape individual maturation and his develop ment of a form of group therapy called transactional analysis. Those undergoing therapy are encouraged to focus on the adult, parent, and child components within themselves in order to attain awareness, spontaneity, intimacy, and, ultimately, personal autonomy. Berne's disciple Thomas Harris credits Berne with creating a “unified system of individual and ...