Treating attachment disorders: From theory to therapy By Karl Heinz Brisch (Translated by Kenneth Kronenberg) New York:  The Guilford Press. 2002.  294 pp.

Psychoanalysts are becoming increasingly interested in, and informed about, attachment theory and research. Major psychoanalytic journals have devoted significant sections to attachment research and its implications for developmental psychology and clinical theory. The application of these findings to everyday clinical psychoanalytic work, though, is what really interests psychoanalytic clinicians. It is also, as Brisch notes, the purpose for which Bowlby intended his theory. Integrating theory and new research findings into clinical practice takes particular effort and skill. Fortunately, Brisch has taken the time out of his broad clinical practice to demonstrate how he uses Bowlby's ideas in his day-to-day work.

Brisch treats children, adolescents and adults in Munich, Germany. He heads a department of pediatric psychosomatic medicine and psychotherapy in a teaching hospital there, and is also a training analyst. His primary research interests are infant and child development and early psychotherapeutic interventions. This book was originally published in German by Klett-Cotta Verlag in 1999 under the title Bindungsstörungen: Von der Bindungstheorie zur Therapie, and Inge Bretherton and Anni Bergmann encouraged him to have it translated into English. This translated version has been updated, and in the first section of the book, entitled ‘Attachment theory and its basic concepts’, Brisch cites references as recent as 2001. This is important in such a rapidly evolving research field.

The book is divided into five sections following a brief preface and introduction: ‘Attachment theory and its basic concepts’, ‘Attachment disorders’, ‘Attachment therapy’, ‘Treatment cases from clinical practice’ and ‘Prospects for further application’. The section ‘Treatment cases from clinical practice’ comprises a full three-fifths of the text, filling over 150 pages. This is impressive, and amply fulfills the title's promise of concentrating on treatment.

In the first section, Brisch