I wrote this article for another site but it had decent interest. I thought I would see if it's liked here.

There's a theory called "Transactional Analysis" which essentially breaks down the ego into three sub categories: The Child, The Parent, and The Adult.

According to the theory, when two individuals interact they are initiating a social game. The individual starting the social game does so by presenting one of these three ego states, while the other person reciprocates in an ego state of their own.

If, for example, a customer were to tell a female employee trying to restock a heavy item not to strain herself by doing 'man's work', he would be starting the game from a parent state and expecting a child response.

The employee, likely realizing the game on a subconscious level, can now respond in one of three ways:

As a child: "Thanks! Could you please help me put this away?"

As a parent: "I am not your patron, do not patronize me."

As an adult: "Thanks for the concern but I'll manage."

The first response would indicate to the man that he is in a reciprocal game and the conversation could continue in a pleasant manner.

The second and third response would indicate a 'crossed transaction'. The man would now need to adjust his ego state accordingly, or continue on to try and force the woman into the ego state he desires. If neither party changes their ego state the conversation will come to an abrupt but natural conclusion as there are no more exchanges, known as strokes, for the players to take.

In the case of your friend, she takes on a child state (it should be noted that child state does not have the same negative connotations as 'being childish' as all states are neutral observations) in order to evoke a parent or child response in those she speaks with, which strongly indicates her coming of age at a time when she was either being sheltered by a parent type or encouraged by another child type.

Just like it would be difficult and detrimental to analyize a game of basketball while playing ("I'm going to dribble the ball.", "I'm going to take a step forward.", "I'm going to dribble the ball.", "I'm going to pivot.") so too would it be detrimental to try to track transactions in the midst of a conversation.

The function of TA is to act as a toolset for post conversational analysis. If, for example, you were to be talking to your SO and she were to suddenly and inexplicably (to you, at least) become very upset, you could apply this theory to your memory of the conversation to try and understand where things went wrong. Perhaps she was trying to transition to a serious, Adult/Adult interaction but you missed the cue and continued to make fart jokes. An analysis of the conversation would give you a better understanding of your partner's Adult cue's and make you more able to maintain the peace.

TA can also work proactively. If you were to notice that every time you speak to your boss, you start to ramble like a child waiting for their parents in the principal's office, you could take note of when your adult ego states emerges and what it is comfortable address, and try to ensure all strokes with your boss revolve around those strengths, as to ensure you maintain an adult ego state.

The majority of this information was created or compiled by Eric Berne[1] who wrote a book named the Games People Play. This is an interesting look at the common games (or story arc's) that people and groups of people follow, as well as common ways to subvert those stories.

Fun fact, we often average the same number of strokes with the people in our lives. If, for example, we exchange two strokes with a co-worker on a daily basis ("Hi.", "Hello.") and then that co-worker leaves for a week, the next time we see him we will exchange 10 strokes ("Hi.", "Hello., "Where did you go off to?", "Oh I was on vacation.", "Neat, where did you go?", etc.)