This article gives us a very concise review of the literature concerning the relationship between self-esteem regulation and narcissism, beginning with an excellent review of Freud's contributions. Among authors mentioned are Jacobson, Kernberg, Stolorow, Bibring, and Abraham. Val shows that self-esteem was conceptualized as related only to depression and that Bibring widened this concept by tracing the "epigenesis of 'narcissistic aspiration' to the oral, … anal, … and phallic psychosexual phases." He then presents his own ideas about the relationship between these states. His main thesis is that self-esteem has been misunderstood because it has not been made clear that there is a distinction between self-esteem as a complex ego process and self-esteem seen as a cognitive affective state of being. He feels that this distinction is important if we are to understand the relationship between self-esteem and narcissism. He invokes Kohut's ideas to elaborate his own, using Kohut's definition of self-esteem, which depends upon the proposition that narcissism is a separate developmental line.