First, five areas of influence of infant research on psychoanalytic therapy are outlined: (a) the interpersonal competency of newborns, (b) the progressive organization of development without points of fixation, (c) the nonpejorative conceptualization of dependency, (d) the potential for explaining psychic structure as interrelations of systems, and (e) the explanatory benefit of using state regulation, rather than drives, as motivation for behavior. Then, clinical vignettes demonstrate the applicability of infant research to work via a focus on the inner states of the participants and the development of a “recognition process” by which the specifics of a sense of self are developed. In addition, the applicability of this research is reviewed in three more circumscribed areas: the interactive nature of psychotherapy, the application of studies of attunement and “open space” in mother-infant interactions, and the usefulness of experimental paradigms for generation of clinical hypotheses.