Psycho-analytic treatment of chronic alcoholism having proved disappointing, the authors devised a comparative experimental study conducted at the Veterans Administration Hospital at Topeka, which is linked with the Menninger Foundation. Four treatment methods were employed and their results compared; they were antabuse therapy, deconditioning treatment with an emetic, group hypnotherapy, and closed ward milieu therapy. Antabuse therapy proved the most effective, deconditioning treatment the least useful. The authors attempt an interpretation of this finding on psychodynamic lines. They regard the externalization of control through treatment, which distinguishes antabuse therapy from the other treatments, as an important therapeutic factor.