Skip to content

Psychodynamic Therapy for Personality Pathology

Treating Self and Interpersonal Functioning

Eve Caligor, M.D., Otto F. Kernberg, M.D., John F. Clarkin, Ph.D., and Frank E. Yeomans, M.D., Ph.D.

  • ISBN 978-1-61537-181-5
  • Item #37181
Video Illustrated!

View Pricing

List Price
$59.00

APA Members
$47.20

20% off

APA Resident-Fellow Members
$44.25

25% off

Description

Deftly combining contemporary theory with clinical practice, Psychodynamic Therapy for Personality Pathology: Treating Self and Interpersonal Functioning is an invaluable resource for any clinician seeking a coherent model of personality functioning and pathology, classification, assessment, and treatment. This insightful guide introduces Transference-Focused Psychotherapy—Extended (TFP-E), a specialized but accessible approach for any clinician interested in the skillful treatment of personality disorders.

Compatible with the DSM-5 Section III Alternative Model for Personality Disorders—and elaborating on that approach, this volume offers clinicians at all levels of experience an accessible framework to guide evaluation and treatment of personality disorders in a broad variety of clinical and research settings.

In this book, readers will find:

  • A coherent model of personality functioning and disorders based in psychodynamic object relations theory
  • A clinically near approach to the classification of personality disorders, coupled with a comprehensive approach to assessment
  • An integrated treatment model based on general clinical principles that apply across the spectrum of personality disorders
  • An understanding of specific modifications of technique that tailor intervention to the individual patient's personality pathology
  • Descriptions of specific psychodynamic techniques that can be exported to shorter-term treatments and acute clinical settings

Patient assessment and basic psychodynamic techniques are described in up-to-date, jargon-free terms and richly supported by numerous clinical vignettes, as well as online videos demonstrating interventions. At the end of each chapter, readers will find a summary of key clinical concepts, making this book both a quick reference tool as well as a springboard for continued learning.

Clinicians looking for an innovative, trustworthy guide to understanding and treating personality pathology that combines contemporary theory with clinical practice need look no further than Psychodynamic Therapy for Personality Pathology: Treating Self and Interpersonal Functioning.

Contents

  • Foreword
  • Preface
  • Video Guide
  • Chapter 1. Introduction: A Model of Treatment Targeting Self and Interpersonal Functioning
  • Section I: Personality and Personality Disorders Through the Lens of Object Relations Theory
  • Chapter 2. Personality and Personality Disorders Within the Framework of Object Relations Theory
  • Chapter 3. Clinical Psychodynamics Within the Framework of Object Relations Theory: Conflict, Anxiety, Defense, and Internal Object Relations
  • Section II: Overview of TFP-E: Basic Tasks, the Therapeutic Relationship, and Strategies of Treatment
  • Chapter 4. Basic Tasks and Elements of Treatment
  • Chapter 5. The Therapeutic Relationship: The Therapist's Attitude and Stance, the Therapeutic Alliance, Transference, and Countertransference
  • Chapter 6. Strategies of Treatment and Mechanisms of Change
  • Section III: The Skillful Consultation
  • Chapter 7. Patient Assessment and Treatment Planning
  • Section IV: Establishing the Treatment Frame
  • Chapter 8. Essential Treatment Contracting: Behaviors, Adjunctive Treatments, and Medication
  • Section V: Techniques and Tactics of TFP-E
  • Chapter 9. Identifying a Focus for Intervention
  • Chapter 10. Intervening I: Exploratory Interventions and the Interpretive Process
  • Chapter 11. Intervening II: Transference Analysis and Tactics Guiding the Interpretive Process
  • Chapter 12. Intervening III: Integrating Supportive and Exploratory Interventions
  • Section VI: Phases of Treatment and Trajectories of Change
  • Chapter 13. Early, Middle, and Advanced Phases of Treatment
  • Chapter 14. Afterword
  • Appendix: Helpful Resources
  • Index

About the Authors

Eve Caligor, M.D., is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and Director of the Psychotherapy Division and Training and Supervising Analyst at the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research, New York, New York.

Otto F. Kernberg, M.D., is Director of the Personality Disorders Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College, Professor of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College, and Training and Supervising Analyst at the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research, New York, New York.

John F. Clarkin, Ph.D., is Codirector of the Personality Disorders Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College and Clinical Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, New York.

Frank E. Yeomans, M.D., Ph.D., is Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College, and Director of Training at the Personality Disorders Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College. He is also Adjunct Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research, New York, New York.

This outstanding new volume by Caligor, Kernberg, Clarkin, and Yeomans introduces Dynamic Psychotherapy for Personality Disorders (DPD), a flexible treatment strategy based on object relations theory. Impairment in self and interpersonal functioning is a central focus of DPD, an approach that aligns well with newer dimensional models of personality pathology, such as the Alternative Model for Personality Disorders in Section III of DSM-5. The authors are known worldwide for their unrivaled expertise in psychodynamic psychotherapy and they are clearly, as this book illustrates, at the top of their game.—John M. Oldham, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Barbara and Corbin Robertson Jr. Endowed Chair for Personality Disorders, Baylor College of Medicine


This book is more of an encyclopedia than a monograph. Its subject is Personality and Personality Disorders—their phenomenology, diagnosis, underlying structure and treatment. Its perspective is object relations theory. It describes the disorders, explains the theory and then describes the approach to treatment that grows out of this understanding. This volume is the capstone of a trilogy, beginning with a treatment manual for transference-focused psychotherapy for borderline personality disorder, then going on to therapy for less serious personality disorders, and finally to this comprehensive overview. Enriched by many clinical vignettes and informed by a huge amount of clinical experience, it has a place on the bookshelf of any clinician who works with these patients.—Robert Michels, M.D., Walsh McDermott University, Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry, Cornell University, Training and Supervising Analyst Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research, Former Joint Editor-in-Chief of The International Journal of Psychoanalysis

Related Products

Become an APA Member
Join Now