ABSTRACT
All methodological themes, whether they are theory, research, methods, or worldviews, are not genuine psychoanalytic themes, but belong to the core competencies of science in general. The subject of clinical research is, in short, the analysis of the psyche; that means the elucidation of the intrapsychic and interpsychic processes going on in the analytic situation in and between patient and analyst. Psychoanalysts, in theory and in their clinical work, and consequently in their clinical research, are dealing with the structure and the dynamics, development and maldevelopment, normal and disturbed functioning of the psyche in its relationship with itself and others. For some analytic authors the term “clinical research” only refers to the analyst’s activities in the analytic situation when exploring the intra-and interpsychic processes. Whoever in psychoanalysis engages in such a theoretical area as scientific research is stirring up a hornets’ nest.
