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The article reviews the current state and future of psychodynamic psychotherapies. In the past few decades psychodynamic psychotherapies have fallen into disrepute due to the fractious and dogmatic nature of different psychodynamic schools of thought and the lack of interest in validating some of its major premises or its effectiveness in comparison with other psychotherapy modalities. Despite these self-inflicted wounds, psychodynamic theory and treatment is staging a comeback. Many of the major premises that comprise the complex, layered model of the mind that are the basis of psychodynamic treatments have again begun to be validated. A list of basic psychodynamic concepts is described. The evidence for each of these concepts varies, but as a whole the evidence is broad and deep for the model of the mind posited by psychoanalysis. This evidence is coming from many fields of knowledge that are not necessarily influenced by psychoanalysis. There have also been significant advances in developing methods and tools that can probe systematically into the complex nature of psychodynamic treatment processes. Finally, statistical tools--such as meta-analytic studies--that can aggregate and compare many different studies at once are beginning to show the effectiveness of dynamic psychotherapies in comparison with other modalities of treatment.

I describe my collaboration with Giovanni over the span of almost 15 years during which time we developed a multimotivational model that built on attachment theory and explored some of its clinical implications. I mention the many ways Giovanni infl uenced my thinking, and provide a few personal stories about Giovanni that give a sense of his generous, warm and creative nature. Throughout the article I describe how I developed some of the ideas we worked on together to provide a broad evolutionary and developmental outlook on human nature. We had planned to write a book together on this ambitious project, but personal circumstances got in the way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper reviews central concepts and research findings of attachment theory emphasizing its clinical relevance to psychoanalytically informed clinicians. We then turn to a historical analysis in order to understand why Bowlby's work was dismissed within psychoanalytic circles and the reasons why Bowlby's contributions and attachment theory have begun to have a significant impact among clinicians within the last ten years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]