Carrying forward his inquiry into the nature and conditions of normal and abnormal development, Lichtenberg focuses on motivation. His goal is to offer an alternative to psychoanalytic drive theory that accommodates the developmental insights of infancy research while accounting for the entire range of phenomena addressed by the theory of instinctual drives. To this end, he propounds a comprehensive theory of the self, which then gains expression in five discrete yet interactive motivational systems.

Introduction. The Self and Other Conceptual Tools. The Motivational Systems Based in the Regulation of Physiological Requirements. The Attachment-Affiliation Motivational System: Part I. The Attachment-Affiliation Motivational System: Part II. The Exploratory-Assertive Motivational System. The Aversive Motivational System. The Sensual-Sexual Motivational System. Model Scenes, Affects, and the Unconscious. Empathy, Motivational Systems, and a Theory of Cure. Hadley, The Neurobiology of Motivational Systems.

Joseph D. Lichtenberg, M.D., is Editor-in-Chief of Psychoanaytic Inquiry, Director Emeritus of the Institute of Contemporary Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, and past President of the International Council for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology. He has authored and edited numerous books and articles, including Craft and Spirit: A Guide to the Exploratory Psychotherapies (Analytic Press, 2005) and, with Frank Lachmann and James Fosshage, A Sprit of Inquiry: Communication in Psychoanalysis (Analytic Press, 2002).