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Since the inception of psychoanalysis, a great many analysts have been intensely interested in checking their findings and the usefulness of their concepts by other scientific methods. In the last few years an ever increasing number of nonanalytical psychologists have dealt with the same problem and a great variety of psychological approaches have been utilized. Some of this has been merely translation work based on the desire of various psychological schools to express, in their own language, whatever they consider acceptable in the findings of analysis. It is also obvious that all of the facets of psychoanalytic theory are not equally amenable to investigation by, for instance, experimental methods. Nevertheless, from the point of view of analysis we consider this tendency, if executed in an objective way, a most fortunate one. It also seems desirable to give this trend in modern psychology the place it actually deserves in the teaching program of psychoanalytic institutes.
Sears' book is extremely valuable in that it gives a clear and objective account of some of the research done in this field by psychologists during the last few years. Sears himself is the author of a few of the most interesting contributions which he discusses. He feels that 'all the work … serves to emphasize the increasing significance attached to psychoanalysis, by nonanalysts, as a guide to the planning of research on personality'.
The first part of the book deals mostly with Freud's findings and hypotheses on sexual development and sexual distortions. The papers he quotes (which are partly in agreement and partly in disagreement with analysis), and the way he discusses them, should be read by every analyst interested in the validity of the basic theories of his science. It has to be said, however, that the methods of quite a few of the studies discussed are inadequate to the subjects they treat. In these instances the analyst would err in accepting their contentions and conclusion