Handbook of Evidence-Based Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: Bridging the Gap Between Science and Practice, edited by Raymond A. Levy and J. Stuart Ablon, New York:  Humana Press, 2009,  399 pp., $99.50

The Handbook of Evidence-Based Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: Bridging the Gap Between Science and Practice (edited by Raymond A. Levy and J. Stuart Ablon) presents a lucid and timely review of research advances assessing the efficacy and effectiveness of psychodynamic psychotherapies in treating many psychological disorders. From research on broad-based meta-analyses of the effectiveness of psychodynamic psychotherapy to close process analysis of therapist and patient interactions, the invited contributors of this volume translate complex research findings into clinically relevant information for clinicians working in the field.

Many psychoanalysts and psychodynamic therapists are conflicted about integrating systematic psychodynamic research into their clinical practice. Beyond the enduring debates over ep stemology and complaints of reductionism, the barrier between clinicians and researchers is often a matter of translation. Complex statistical techniques, foreign experimental methodologies, and operational definitions of complex constructs leave many clinicians jaundiced to the entire enterprise. Problems of translation have, for decades, impeced the natural synergy between empirical research and the consulting room. In this volume Levy, Ablon, and 39 of psychodynamic psychotherapy research's best provide a cogent, evocative translation of clinically relevant empirical research, providing case examples that illuminate the study findings. The overall effect is a true bridging of the divide between clinicians and researcher, in part because each contributor is a dedicated clinician-researcher working and studying in that gap.

This volume is organized to lead the reader from broad-based reviews of psychodynamic psychotherapy outcome studies to examining in-session processes of patient-therapist interactions that affect patient's well-being, improvement, and personality change. The reader is invited to consider the evidence and future potential in mapping neurological