Issues on Therapeutic Action and Self Psychology: A Commentary

Abstract

In response to Frank's and Bernstein's (2012) “Therapeutic Action: An Introduction and Overview,” I take the opportunity to argue that the self psychology in its original emphasis on the self/selfobject matrix was structurally a relational model, subsequently evolving through Kohut and contemporary self psychologists and intersubjectivists into a fuller relational approach. The term “provision” does not, in this author's view, accurately represent either Kohut's or relational self psychologists’ theory of therapeutic action.

Keywords:

• self/selfobject matrix
• provision
• therapeutic action
• relational
• new relational experience
• rupture/repair cycles
• structurally relational model