Transaction analysis as a philosophy, adopts a positive and humanistic approach (Woollams & Brown, 1979). It is given that human beings have are basically lovable and everyone have an aspiration for growth and self-actualization. Thus, if "I'm OK," "You're OK." You and me are equal. "I'm OK and You're OK" is one of the basic assumptions of Transaction Analysis. Another assumption of TA is that all individuals have the ability to think, except of course for people who have severe brain damage and that people are responsible for living the consequences of their decisions (Steward & Joines, 1987).
This principle forms the theory of psychopathology and chance in TA with the psychopathology conceived as an outcome of dysfunctional behavior patterns taken on in a person's early childhood as a natural response to pressure in the society or environment.
Transactions, strokes, and maladaption are other factors in TA. TA espouses that a response by one person will serve as a stimulus reaction to another person. This is through social interaction which in turn produces chains of stimulus-response transactions with communication flowing between parallel ego-states.
On the other hand, crossed transactions happen when a person reacts from a different ego-state which eventually produces complex social interaction. This conflict in communication is said to arise because the people communicating are talking out if difference reference.
TA believes that stroke is a foremost motivating factor of all of human behavior and that it is important to maintain the physical ad psychological well-being of a person. Maladaption happens as a result of the exclusion of ego-states wherein people avoid awareness of painful aspects of their scripts.
