Empirical Studies of Psychoanalytical Theories: Volume 1, edited by Joseph Masling. Hillsdale, NJ, and London: The Analytic Press, Inc., 1983, 320 pp., $29.95.

Many psychoanalytic clinicians are comfortable functioning in the clinical world, using experience-near data. Many others are comfortable in the meta psychological world, using more experience-distant concepts. Some are even able to apply theory to practice, and modify one based on their experience of the other. But the bridge between the two, the middle-level described by Mayman, which represents the empirical joining of the theoretical and clinical, operationalized in the form of research which can inform either the clinical or the theoretical, is an area of lessened comfort for many. It is to this middle-level that Masling's book addresses itself, presenting examples of a wide variety of psychoanalytic research projects. Some are studies of psychoanalytic theory and others of psychoanalytic therapy; some are more empirical and others are more theoretical, some are original and others are reviews of already published material; but all provide an empirical grounding for practice. I will review the major findings and contributions of each of the seven chapters, and conclude with some general comments about psychoanalytic research.