ABSTRACT
The complexity of the psychoanalytic treatment project should make it obvious that any simple approach, perhaps any approach at all to the question of whether psychoanalysis 'works' is doomed to provoke dissension and controversy. This is not just to do with vested interests, with the fact that psychoanalysts are trained to do only this one thing, so telling them it does not work is not likely to be welcome news. It also represents a genuine epistemological, psychological and social debate. There is a tradition of 'process research' in psychotherapy in which the focus has been on those aspects of therapist and patient personality, behaviour and interaction that are related to outcome. The underlying assumption of much of this research is that, since evaluative studies have shown a generally modest positive impact of psychotherapy of all kinds, it is far-fetched to imagine that the effective components are the unique property of any one 'brand name' psychotherapy.
