Meissner wrote this four-part sequel to The Paranoid Process1 to show how his theoretical formulations could be applied in clinical work. The first section summarizes "The Paranoid Process as a Theory of Therapy" and sets forth a "Psychotherapeutic Schema." The second, "Psychopathology of the Paranoid Process and Its Treatment," includes chapters on schizophrenia, borderline pathology, and narcissism. The third discusses "Psychotherapy of the Paranoid Patient." The fourth, called "The Paranoid Process in Clinical Contexts," includes chapters on adolescence, suicide, addiction, and aging.

Meissner considers paranoid illness an experimentum naturae illuminating processes involved in the formation and consolidation of personality structure—both healthy and pathological. The term "paranoid process" refers to a "universal" set of mechanisms: introjection, projection, and paranoid construction. Introjection is the process