Viewing this volume from the vantage point of a psychoanalyst, I have a distinctly mixed reaction. On the face of it, this is a well-edited, carefully thought-out group of papers and discussions—a series of scholarly presentations. The papers reflect the dedicated efforts of researchers to test experimentally the effectiveness of a wide range of therapeutic modalities. As a means of scanning these endeavors and obtaining a sense of their accomplishments and unresolved dilemmas, the book is an unusually clear and comprehensive contribution.

It is disquieting, however, to realize that this research, even when it approaches the level of the appraisal of psychoanalytic therapy found in Kernberg's and Robbins's presentations based on the Menninger Foundation Psychotherapy Research Project, is still in a very primitive state of development and utilizes remarkably naïve measures of change. These investigations are, on the whole, simplistic and superficial; they do not begin to work with the complex variables