120 Book Reviews

In another excellent chapter, borderline personality disorder is thoroughly discussed from the perspectives of dialectical, paradoxical, and behavioral ap- proaches. A number of treatment strategies are mentioned that include problem solving, irreverent communication relationships, and contingency strategies. The proposed treatment intervention is organized around a hierarchy of behavioral goals with each client.

An entire chapter is devoted to couples paradoxical therapy in which methods such as reframing, relabeling, therapeutic prescriptions, retraining, and position- ing are reviewed. A good case is made for PT’s use when patient resistance has resulted in the failure of traditional behavioral marital therapy. The indications as well as contraindications for PT are discussed.

The final two chapters address paradoxical treatments with families and in child-focused psychotherapy. Both chapters are well done and provide plenty of case examples.

Overall, this is a high-quality work that provides both a comprehensive intro- duction to its subject and a valuable supplement to graduate students as well as clinical practitioners. The comprehensive literature review provided throughout the book offers the reader a full range of references for additional information or research.

FRANK M. DATTILIO University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine

Handbook of Clinical Psychophysiology. By G. Turpin (Ed.). Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, 1989. 633 pp. $134.00.

Clinical psychophysiology has seen tremendous growth in recent years but lacks a standard set of literature sources one might consult for definitive information on phenomena, theory, method, and application, The editor has assembled a very distinguished set of authors for this clinical text in the Wiley series of psychophys- iology handbooks. In approaching this volume, several questions arise: Is clinical psychophysiology ready for a handbook ? Has the field reached a point of confidence and consensus where its knowledge base may be distilled into a single reference? If so, is this text truly a handbook? Is this text a handbook for the clinical researcher or for the provider of clinical services?

Section 1 (eight chapters) provides a variety of perspectives on general theoret- ical and methodological issues. Each chapter is quite good and offers a great deal to the reader interested in a high-level introduction to the field. For example, a chapter by Iacono and Ficken provides a systematic proposal on how to approach psychopathology with psychophysiology, as well as an unusually accessible intro- duction to the concepts of “marker” and behavior genetics in this context. Similarly, the survey of statistical issues by Stemmler and Fahrenberg would serve as an excellent beginning for a graduate seminar on the topic.

Section 2’s 11 chapters consider specific disorders and how the technology of clinical psychophysiology may be brought to bear in the study, assessment, and treatment of each. Despite the prodigious length and cost of the book, the roster of topics is not exhaustive. There are no chapters on some disorders of major interest, such as headache, child behavior disorders, or applications to geriatric problems. On the other hand, the diligent reader will find useful material on specific applications in some of the chapters of Section 1 (such as headache in the

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assessment chapter by Haynes, Falkin, and Sexton-Radek). Similarly, readers can use the excellent index to discover more extensive coverage than the chapter titles suggest (such as Type A behavior, in chapters on behavioral medicine by Steptoe and hypertension by Goldstein). Any single volume must be selective, and the editor has included a broad and interesting sample of disorders, demonstrating the impressive scope of clinical psychophysiology.

On balance, the book is a high-quality survey of the field. Not a single chapter is weak or disappointing. This is not a handbook of methods (although some chapters do provide considerable methodological material) or a reference manual for the provider of clinical services. Nor does it attempt a comprehensive review of empirical findings. The audience appears to be the clinical researcher desiring advanced consideration and integration of selected issues which remain unre- solved, rather than practitioners desiring specific guidance about ready applica- tions, This emphasis accurately reflects the state of the field. Although this book is not all that one could want a handbook to be, it succeeds at what is possible now.

GREGORY A. MILLER University of Illinois