This series of three lectures, delivered at the opening of the 1947–1948 term of instruction at the Washington School of Psychiatry, was intended to orient the incoming group of psychiatric candidates. A schematic exposition of the field theory of interpersonal relations is presented and then illustrated by a hypothetical case of paranoid schizophrenia as it might be managed by three psychiatrists with different therapeutic approaches. Sullivan urges the field theory on the students, contrasting it with the best the hypothetical patient could derive from psychoanalysis, namely, the avoidance of an acute schizophrenic episode 'by "sublimating his homosexuality" or "resolving his Oedipus hostility" or something of that sort which could be expressed more helpfully in terms of a field theory'. Among the practical hints for adjustment to the course of study, the suggestion is included that a dissident candidate, who persists in believing 'that Freud's original libido theory is an adequate basis for his current clinical thinking', may become a subject for administrative consideration.