Science, Systems and Psychoanalysis

Robert Langs, M.D., is well known as the author of many books on the subject of psychoanalytic psychotherapy, including 'The Technique of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy' (2 volumes), 'Psychotherapy: A Basic Text' , 'A Primer of Psychotherapy ' and 'Decoding Your Dreams'. He is currently Executive Director at the Program for Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy at the Beth Israel Medical Center, New York; Clinical Professor with the Department of Psychiatry, Mt. Sinai Hospital and School of Medicine, New York; and Visiting Clinical Investigator at the Nathan S. Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, New York.

'Robert Langs has established himself through his contributions over the last score of years as a major contributor to the disciplines of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. He has been one of the prominent advocates of the bi-personal emphasize - his view of the field of interaction arising between therapist and patient as a "bi-personal field" is well known. Those who have followed the development of his ideas over the years will not be surprised by the line of thinking in his new work, since it is essentially an attempt to systematize and articulate his basic clinical insights in a more scientifically consistent and acceptable way.The contribution here should be saluted and respected as it enters the field of dispute and challenge. The effort to clarify the database and to rationalize its implementation in scientifically and methodologically acceptable terms is both courageous and praiseworthy.'- From the Foreword by W.W. Meissner'Bob Langs, in this new book aims to take psychoanalytic enterprise a step further in its development into a mature science by adding measurement and a more formal (i.e. quantative and perhaps logical) systems approach. How well he succeeds, I leave readers to judge for themselves. For my part, I am sufficiently impressed to accept his invitation to write this introduction.'- Karl H. Pribram, from the Introduction

• Preface -- Foreword -- Introduction -- Observation, Theory, and Practice in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy -- The call for a science of psychoanalysis -- Two psychoscopes -- Systems and Subsystems in Psychoanalysis -- A systems theory for psychoanalysis -- The systems of the mind -- System overload -- Psychoanalysis and Science -- Psychoanalysis as an Aristotelian science -- Clinical implications of an interactional science of psychoanalysis