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1. ©2006 Institute of Psychoanalysis
Attachment theory and psychoanalysis
Some remarks from an epistemological and from a Freudian viewpoint1
SIEGFRIED ZEPF
Narzissenstr 5, D-66119 Saarbrücken, Germany — s.zepf@rz.uni-saarland.de
(Final version accepted 9 March 2006)
The author examines Bowlby’s attachment theory and more recent versions of it from
an epistemological viewpoint and subjects it to questioning on whether they are in
line with central concepts of Freudian psychoanalysis. He argues that Bowlby’s basic
tenets regarding attachment theory, which later attachment theorists never seriously
questioned, do not conform to scientific standards, and that psychoanalytic issues
such as the dynamic unconscious, internal conflicts, interaction of drive wishes and
the role of defence in establishing substitutive formations are either ignored or not
treated in sufficient depth. In the light of this, Fonagy’s assertion that psychoanalytic
criticism of attachment theory arose from mutual misunderstandings and ought
nowadays to be seen as outdated is reversed: psychoanalytic criticism can only be
regarded as outdated if either basic tenets of Freudian psychoanalysis, or attachment
theory or both are misunderstood.
Keywords: attachment theory, psychoanalysis, epistemology
Along with the increasing psychoanalytic interest in observation of infants during
the last two decades, attachment theory has grown more and more important in
psychoanalysis. As early as 1971, Matte-Blanco (1971, p. 198), when review-
ing Bowlby’s first volume of Attachment and loss, felt that its impact upon ideas
regarding the psychobiological foundations of psychoanalysis was bound to be
significant, and, 16 years afterwards, Emde (1997, quoted in Bernardi, 1998,
p. 798) opened a panel discussion on ‘Attachment’ with the remark that recent
attachment research, based on the theories of Bowlby and the research of Mary
Ainsworth, had exerted considerable influence on psychoanalysis. Three years
later, Seligman (2000) offered support for this view, stating that psychoanalysis
had renewed itself in all areas via integration of attachment theory, a development
which—if one follows Mitchell (1999, p. 85)—was due to the fact that Bowlby
‘was several steps ahead of his own time’.
Similarly, Diamond and Blatt (1999, p. 427) stated that, despite initial controversy
between attachment theory and psychoanalysis, further developments in both disci-
plines allowed the two traditions to become increasingly synchronized. They claim—
referring to different papers—that the synthesis of concepts from psychoanalysis and
attachment theory has led to a better understanding of the representational world (e.g.
Diamond and Blatt, 1994), of affect regulation (e.g. Silverman, 1998), of aspects of
Int J Psychoanal 2006;87:1529–48
1
Translated by Judith Anne Zepf and David Turnbull.

2. 1530 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
the therapeutic process (e.g. Fonagy, 1991), and that the application of attachment
theory concepts to clinical phenomena has contributed substantially to an understand-
ing of the origins of various forms of psychopathological developments, including
anxiety (e.g. Cassidy, 1995), depression (e.g. Blatt and Homann, 1992) and personal-
ity disorders (e.g. Fonagy, 1991).
However, it has remained questionable whether this integration of attachment
theory has led to a renewal of psychoanalysis or not. Gilmore (1990, p. 496), for
example, argued that attachment theory offers no alternative metapsychology, no
true developmental psychology, and fails to address the pivotal role attributed to
emotional conflicts, the cornerstone of psychoanalytic theory. Thus, she added,
‘present attachment theory as a competing psychoanalytic school can only diminish
its value’. Kernberg (1976, p. 121) criticized Bowlby for neglecting the internal
world and internalized object relations as major structural organizers, and Dowling
found in attachment theory ‘no dynamic unconscious, no interplay of impulse and
defense, no conflict, no compromise formation’ (1985, p. 106).
In his analysis of various psychoanalytic criticisms, Fonagy (1999, p. 449; see
also Mitchell, 1999) assesses these critiques as ‘based on misapprehension’ which
ought to be ‘outdated’ by now. Fonagy (2001, pp. 185f.) acknowledges that attach-
ment theory should pay more attention to systematic distortions of the child’s
perceptions of the external world and to the fact that internal working models can
be in conflict which each other, whereby some of them may have a ‘greater access
to consciousness than others’. He maintains, however, that Freud’s description ‘of
the ego’s capacity to create defenses that organize characterological and sympto-
matic constructions as part of the developmental process became a cornerstone of
Bowlby’s trilogy’ (1999, pp. 451f., 2001, pp. 158f.), and that Bowlby in chapter 17
of the first volume of his trilogy describes the representational system mediating
and ensuring the continuity of interpersonal behaviour with relative clarity (1999,
p. 455, 2001, p. 163). Fonagy (2001, pp. 158–63) also argues that four aspects of
attachment theory and psychoanalysis overlap epistemologically. Both theories, he
states, assume that social perception and social experience are distorted by expecta-
tions, that the first years of life are most important for the personality development,
that maternal sensitivity is a causal factor in determining the quality of object rela-
tionships and therefore psychic development, and—referring to the British object
relations school in particular—that the infant–caregiver relationship is based on an
independent need for a relationship. Additionally, in both theories early relation-
ships provide the context within which certain critical psychological functions are
acquired and developed (2001, p. 164), both focus on a specific symbolic function—
that of ‘mentalization’ (2001, p. 165)—and both strive for an understanding of
personality development and psychological disorder (2001, pp. 191f.).
The controversial views on the conceptual compatibility of attachment theory and
psychoanalysis necessitate clarification. As it is impossible to compare all existing
versions of attachment theory with all the different elaborations of psychoanalysis
within the scope of this paper, I limit myself to an epistemological evaluation of
Bowlby’s basic tenets and to comparison of these with central issues of Freudian
psychoanalysis. By this, I mean issues which remained unchanged throughout Freud’s

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ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
work, amongst these the pleasure–unpleasure-principle—the general striving of an
individual to achieve the most favourable relationship between pleasure and unpleas-
ure—and the assumption of drives—understood as strivings for sensory contacts on
erotogenic zones (Zepf, 2000)—and of internal conflicts between drive wishes and sat-
isfaction caused by external events and followed by defence mechanisms thus forming
the dynamic unconscious which determines an individual’s behaviour and reappears
in the form of substitutive formations in consciousness. Whereas in the post-Freudian
era other basic Freudian tenets have been discussed and have been abandoned at least
by some psychoanalysts—for instance the concept of primal repression (e.g. Brenner,
1957; Maze and Henry, 1996), the concept of the centrality of the Oedipus complex
(e.g. Basch, 1987; Blos, 1989; Whitebook, 1995), or the economic explanation of
internal affairs (e.g. Habermas, 1968; Kubie, 1947; Rubinstein, 1976; Sandler, 1983;
Zepf, 2001)—Bowlby’s basic tenets of attachment theory have hitherto not been
seriously and questioned by attachment theorists. They are seen obviously as being
equally valid for the more recent versions of his theory. If this can be upheld, an inves-
tigation of the compatibility of Bowlby’s basic tenets with psychoanalytic concepts
could also shed some light on whether these more recent versions are consistent with
basic tenets of Freudian psychoanalysis. Following this, an attempt will be made to
find out whether the criticisms can be upheld or whether Fonagy’s request is justified
and previous ‘points of divergence between classical psychoanalysis and attachment
theory constitute [now] points of convergence between contemporary psychoanalysis
and attachment theory’(Eagle, 1995, p. 123), and whether the psychoanalytic concepts
Gilmore (1990), Kernberg (1976) and Dowling (1985) declared to be missing are
actually inherent in attachment theory and its subsequent versions.
Bowlby’s basic tenets
Attachment theory was developed by Bowlby (1969, 1973, 1979, 1980) 30 years ago.
Its basic assumptions are that human and animal behaviour is determined causally
by ‘hormones, characteristics of CNS, and environmental stimuli’ (1969, pp. 89f.),
and, similar to certain mechanical systems (1969, pp. 41f., 139), are controlled by
feedback circuits. Central concepts are
…those of behavioural systems and their control, of information, negative feedback, and a
behavioural form of homeostasis … Execution of a plan, it is supposed, is initiated on the
receipt of a certain information (derived by the sense organs either from external sources
or from internal sources, or from a combination of the two) and guided, and ultimately
terminated, by the continuous reception of further sets of information that have their origin
in the results of the action taken (and are derived, in the same way, by the sense organs from
external, internal, or combined sources). In the determination of the plans themselves and of
signals that control their execution, both learned and unlearned components are assumed to
enter. (1969, p. 18, italics omitted)
The ‘function’ common to these biological systems
…is that consequence of its activity … promotes the survival of the species (or population)
of which the organism is a member’ and they ‘develop within an individual through the
interaction during ontogeny of genetically determined bias and the environment in which the
individual is reared. (1973, p. 82)

4. 1532 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
Attachment behaviour of a newborn infant would serve the same biological
function, being based on an independent behavioural system developed during the
evolutionary process. According to Bowlby, its value for survival lay in the protec-
tion it gave to animals as well as to the first humans ‘from predators’, and today it
would protect humans from dangers of everyday life (1973, p. 143). Bowlby turns
explicitly against what he calls the ‘cupboard love theory of object relations’(1969,
p. 178), which he attributes to Freud and which asserts that a baby attaches itself to
the mother because she is satisfying its ‘physiological needs’, and learns ‘that she
is the source of his gratification’. His main argument is that attachment to mothers
develops, both in humans and in animals, independently and not through nourish-
ment (1969, pp. 210ff.).
In Bowlby’s view, the category ‘drive’ can be rejected as a motivational system.
The ‘concept of drive’, Bowlby states, ‘becomes … the less useful … the better we
come to understand the causal factors influencing instinctual behaviour’, i.e. the
more it is understood as ‘a result of an activation of behavioural systems’ (1969,
p. 135). Therefore, ‘neither the concept of instinct as an entity nor that of drive is
employed’ (p. 135) in Bowlby’s reasoning. ‘[S]exual behaviour’, for example, is
not instigated by a drive, but is ‘a system of behaviour distinct from attachment
behaviour’ (p. 230) whose survival value lies in its reproductive function, and in
which ‘hormonal states of the organism and certain characteristics of the partner,
together, lead to sexual interest and play causal roles in eliciting sexual behaviour’
(1979, p. 122).
As with drives, neither needs, wishes, nor emotions have motivational power.
‘Need’ is just another term referring ‘to the requirements of species survival’ (1969,
pp. 137f.). Needs are not a ‘behavioural system nor does any of them cause the
activation of a behavioural system’. Needs only ‘determine the function that behav-
ioural systems have to serve’ (p. 138). And in turn the terms ‘“wish” and “desire”
refer to a human subject’s awareness of a set-goal of some behavioural system or
integrate of systems that is already in action, or at least alerted for action’ (p. 138).
Affects, emotions, and feelings are understood as a passive element of behaviour
evolving during the process of evaluation. This process consists of ‘comparing input
with standards that have developed within the organism during its lifetime’, and of
‘selecting certain general forms of behaviour in preference to other forms in accord-
ance with the results of comparisons previously made’ (p. 112, italics omitted),
whereby parts of this process are ‘being felt’ (p. 108).
Epistemological problems of attachment theory
Before I discuss the arguments Bowlby puts forward against psychoanalysis, I would
like to point out some epistemological problems inherent in his conceptualizations.
Bowlby (1969, pp. 41f., 139) begins his argumentation with a cybernetic
feedback-model under which mechanical as well as living systems are subsumed
(pp. 65, 139), and equalizes them (p. 42) in a structural sense with an ‘elaborated
room thermostat’. Such a thermostat would not only register a decrease in heat,
but also switch on cooling mechanisms, react to discrepancies between heat and

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ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
cold as well as to the rate at which a difference is increased or decreased, and in
order to ensure ‘that the temperature is kept at an exact level, all the machinery
could be duplicated or triplicated, using perhaps analogous but not identical proc-
esses’ (pp. 42f.).
Using the same room thermostat as an example von Bertalanffy describes the
characteristics of this feedback-model as follows:
The minimal elements of a cybernetic system are a ‘receptor’ accepting ‘stimuli’ from
outside as ‘input’; from this a ‘message’ is led to a center, which in some way reacts to the
message and, as a rule, amplifies the signal received; the center, in its turn, transmits the
message to an ‘effector’ which eventually reacts to the stimulus with a response as ‘output’.
The output, however, is monitored back, by a feedback loop, to the receptor, which senses
the preliminary response and steers the subsequent action of the system so that eventually
the ‘desired result’ is obtained. In this way the system is self-regulating … The function of
the cybernetic system further depends on ‘messages’ received from the outside and playing
between receptor, center, and effector, that is on transmission of a something which … has a
‘meaning’ to the system. This constitutes ‘information’. (1967, pp. 65f.)
As Engel (1971, pp. 184f.) argued in quoting von Bertalanffy (1967), this cyber-
netic model is a special case of general system theory in so far as it is ‘“closed” with
regard to exchange of matter with environment, and “open” only to information’
(1967, p. 68). ‘For this reason’, von Bertalanffy goes on, ‘the cybernetic model does
not provide for an essential characteristic of living systems, whose components are
continually destroyed in catabolic and replaced in anabolic processes, with corollar-
ies such as growth, development and differentiation’ (1967, p. 68).
It goes without saying that even in Bowlby’s times his cybernetic model contra-
dicted psychoanalysis in so far as psychoanalysis did not conceptualize humans as
closed systems but as open ones (e.g. Hartmann, 1964).
Similarly, his attempts to substantiate his thesis that humans’behavioural systems
are determined genetically are questionable. Bowlby (1969, pp. 184ff.) quotes data
from evolutionary biology and argues that attachment behaviour in humans and
sub-human primates shows a structural similarity. However, given structurally
similar behaviour amongst different species, it does not necessarily follow that it is
instigated for the same reason.2
Bowlby believes that ‘a teleological theory … lies outside the realm of science …
because such a theory entails supposing that the future determines the present through
some form of “finalistic causation”’ (1969, pp. 124f.). Yet, concealed in the term
‘teleonomic’ (pp. 41, 139) he himself argues in a teleological manner. As regards
finalistic causation it makes no difference if I say, ‘Behavioural systems have the
biological function to guarantee the survival of the species’ or if I say, ‘Behavioural
systems have the biological aim to guarantee the survival of the species’.
One could argue in favour of Bowlby that in the case of goal-directed
behaviour—which is governed by general laws and which he assumes (pp. 65, 139)
2
When dogs bark and humans speak their behaviour is identical in a structural sense in that both species
produce sounds. However, this structural identity does not allow concluding that both species produce
sounds for the same reason.

6. 1534 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
characterizes the operations of ‘any system, living or mechanical’3
—teleological
explanations can be transformed into causal explanations. If we suppose that a
process is completely determined, in the sense that the whole sequence of events
between the initial state and the final state is governed by general laws, it makes no
difference whether a process is explained from its beginning or from its end. For,
in terms of formal logic, teleological and causal explanations are interchangeable:
if the phenomenon A is a necessary condition for the subsequent phenomenon B,
one can also say that B is a sufficient condition for the existence of A, and if A is a
sufficient condition for the existence of B, then B is a necessary condition for A.
However, only the operations of machines and the behaviour of most subhuman
forms of living can truly be subsumed under general laws, but not human behaviour.
Human behaviour is not goal-directed, but goal-intended. Nagel (1977; see also
Dretske, 1988, pp. 117ff.) differentiated between goal-intended and goal-directed
behaviour as follows: whereas goal-intended behaviour, being specific for human
behaviour in particular, is not driven by causal mechanisms, but by motives—thus
implying cognitive representations of the initial state and the desired final state—
goal-directed behaviour, characterizing mechanical operations and the behaviour of
most sub-humans, does not presuppose cognition, and is causally determined in so
far as the final state implies the initial state as a necessary condition.
As goal-intended behaviour does not follow any general laws whatsoever (e.g.
Dretske, 1988, p. 120),4
teleological explanations cannot be transferred into causal
explanations. When Bowlby names ‘hormones, characteristics of CNS, and envi-
ronmental stimuli’ (1969, pp. 89f.) as causal factors, and at the same time justifies
humans’behavioural systems as necessary for the survival of the species, he is inter-
mingling causal and teleological explanations in a manner that must be rejected as
non-scientific, even by Bowlby’s epistemological standards.
For similar reasons it is not possible to construct the future out of the present,
as Bowlby goes on to do. He describes his scientific strategy as follows: including
findings of evolutionary biology and using
…as primary data observations of how very young children behave in defined situation, an
attempt is made to describe certain early phases of personality functioning and, from them, to
extrapolate forwards … The change in perspective is radical. It entails as our starting point,
nor this or that symptom or syndrome … but an event or experience deemed to be potentially
pathogenic to the developing personality. (1969, p. 4)
Whereas Freud started from the present and tried to reconstruct the past, Bowlby
reverses Freud’s perspective, thus misjudging the fact that the behaviour of small
infants cannot predict future behaviour. A scientific prognosis would demand that
the development of their behaviour were governed by general laws as in the case
of goal-directed behaviour. As this is not the case, the present only allows one to
conclude its origins but not to preclude what is going to happen later.
3
Thus, Bowlby not only ‘treats humans as though they were animals’, as Susanna Isaacs Elmhirst, a
Kleinian psychoanalyst, remarked (quoted in Grosskurth, 1986, p. 406), but he also treats both humans
and animals as though they were machines.
4
If I visit a friend to please him, it can neither be concluded that when I and other persons want to please
friends we will always visit them nor that we always visit friends for this reason.

7. 1535
ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
In addition, some of Bowlby’s argumentation appears to be tautological. For
instance, when discussing the survival of the species the factual survival of the
species leads Bowlby to conclude that there is a biological function guaranteeing
survival inherent in every behavioural system. After justifying this function with the
survival, he then explains the survival with this function.5
Bowlby’s basic tenets and central issues of Freudian psychoanalysis
In addition to these epistemological weaknesses, several problems arise when com-
paring his basic tenets with central psychoanalytic issues. For instance, if one follows
Bowlby, the biological function of preservation of the species is the only function
sexual behaviour has. Freud, however, separated sexuality and reproduction on a con-
ceptual level (e.g. Freud, 1916–7, p. 321), thus opening the field of psychosexuality,
for in his view ‘in man the sexual instinct does not originally serve the purpose of
reproduction at all, but has at its aim the gaining of particular kinds of pleasure’(1908,
p. 188). In restricting sexual behaviour to ‘fertilisation and reproduction’ (Bowlby,
1973, p. 82), Bowlby disregards Freud’s discovery of psychosexuality.
Furthermore, as Engel (1971) and Anna Freud (1960) have already pointed out,
when questioning psychoanalytic concepts Bowlby does not confront his findings
with psychoanalytic theory but with his distorted reception of the same. Thus, in
arguing that the sibling’s attachment to the mother figure is independent of drive
needs and biologically based, Bowlby equates Freud’s notion of drive with ‘major
somatic needs’ (Freud, 1900, p. 565) which Freud explicitly differentiated from
sexual drive needs. The aims of sexual drives are not intake or elimination of some-
thing, but sensory contacts. In Freud’s view sexual drives originate in conjunction
with the satisfaction of ‘major somatic needs’(1900, p. 565) like ‘hunger and thirst,’
which Freud subsumed under self-preservation- or ego-instincts until about 1916
(1916–7, p. 412):
The first organ to emerge as an erotogenic zone and to make libidinal demands on the
mind is, from the time of birth onwards, the mouth. To begin with, all psychical activity is
concentrated on providing satisfaction for the needs of that zone. Primarily, of course, this
satisfaction serves the purpose of self-preservation by means of nourishment; but physiology
should not be confused with psychology. The baby’s obstinate persistence in sucking gives
evidence at an early stage of a need for satisfaction which, though it originates from and is
instigated by the taking of nourishment, nevertheless strives to obtain pleasure independently
of nourishment and for that reason may and should be termed sexual. (1940, p. 154; see also
1905a, pp. 182ff., 1914b, p. 86, 1916–7, p. 313, 1923, p. 245)
If one adds that ‘‘oral’ experiences’ include not only sucking but also ‘the earliest
experiences minimising excitations: Skin contacts (warmth … touching), acoustic
5
Bowlby’s assumption that attachment behaviour has a selective advantage as it promotes the survival of
the species is the only one that has been questioned. For Fonagy Bowlby’s assumption is ‘inconsistent
with the advances of sociobiology and behavior genetics’ (2001, p. 187). He argues that the ‘“survival
of the species” is not what drives evolution. It is the survival of the genetic code carried by a particular
individual that is at an evolutionary premium’. Yet to alter ‘survival of the species’ in ‘survival of the
genetic code’ does not alter its tautological character.

8. 1536 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
contact (speech and intonation) and passive comforting by being moved to and fro’
(Mitscherlich, 1967, p. 32), and if one understands that ‘“[o]ral” is a single-word
representation of a complex mother–child constellation’including ‘tactile gratifica-
tion’ which is of ‘greater importance … as compared to direct feeding experience’
(Whitman, 1963, p. 772), the evolutionary-biological reasoning Bowlby uses to
support his thesis that attachment behaviour is an independent striving loses its
substance. Bowlby takes recourse to Harlow’s famous investigation of infant
primates to justify his refuting of Freud’s assumption that a child attaches itself
on to the mother because it has experienced her as the source of satisfaction of its
drives. The infant primates were taken from their mothers and raised in cages with
artificial figures as surrogate mothers, one a wire-surface figure and another figure
that was supple and covered in a soft terrycloth. In a series of varied experiments
Harlow showed that, regardless of nourishment, infant monkeys consistently pre-
ferred the terrycloth mother offering contact comfort to the solely milk-dispensing
figure, and that they clung to the soft-surface mother in situations of perceived
danger or uncertainty. It seems obvious that the infant monkeys preferred the soft-
surface mother because she offered tactile gratification and bodily contacts—i.e.
satisfaction of oral needs (see also Arlow, 1963; Erikson, 1970; Greenspan, 1988).
‘Harlow’s findings,’ noted Spitz,
…prove experimentally what I have stressed for a quarter of a century: the importance
of breast feeding in establishing object relations does not lie in the fact that it assuages
hunger and thirst. That it stimulates the primal cavity, the oral region, is also only part of
its significance. As I see it, the major role of breast feeding in the establishment of object
relations lies in the fact that it enforces the most consistent, the most multiform contact with
the mother’s body. (1962, p. 296, my italics)
The resulting attachment to the mother figure is not just due to drive satisfaction
in the form of pleasurable sensory contacts. The object is also chosen ‘accord-
ing to the anaclitic [attachment] type’, Freud argues, because—as Bowlby also
emphasized—‘the mother … becomes … the child’s … first protection against all
the undefined dangers which threaten it in the external world’ (1927, pp. 23f.).
In a similar way to how infant primates clung to the soft-surface mother-figure in
situations of perceived danger, a child’s attachment to an object can also be seen
to stem from its attempts to avoid unpleasure when ‘the infant has found out that
an external, perceptible object can put an end to the dangerous situation’ (Freud,
1926, p. 138). This second motivation for attaching oneself becomes immediately
clear when strivings both for pleasure and to avoid unpleasure conflict which each
other. This may result in defence mechanisms being produced if ‘the motive force
of unpleasure shall have acquired more strength than the pleasure obtained from
satisfaction’ (1915b, p. 147). In terms of object relations, the realization of a drive
wish is threatened by an external danger—such as object loss, loss of the object’s
love, or castration (Freud, 1926)—so that in conflicts the striving to avoid unpleas-
ure must predominate over the striving for pleasure, and that is precisely the reason
why individuals ward off their drive wishes in order to maintain attachment to their
objects. The ‘loved person,’ Freud stated,

9. 1537
ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
…would not cease to love us nor should we be threatened with castration if we did not
entertain certain feelings and intentions within us. Thus such instinctual impulses are
determinants of external dangers and so become dangerous in themselves; and we can now
proceed against the external danger by taking measures against the internal ones. (1926,
p. 145)
In the face of this—and in agreement with Bernardi (1998, p. 801), Astley and
Jacobson (1970, p. 153), and Anna Freud (1960, p. 55)—Bowlby’s postulate
that attachment is a striving in itself proves to be no more than a manifestation
of what Freud (1914b, p. 87) has termed the ‘anaclitic type’ of object relation-
ship, serving both drive satisfaction and the avoidance of unpleasure. One of the
reasons why Bowlby was not aware of this may be his misunderstanding of the
pleasure-principle. As Bowlby (1969, pp. 16f.) understands it, Freud’s pleasure-
principle refers only to an increase or decrease of excitation; Freud, however,
always used this term also to designate feelings of pleasure and unpleasure. As on
several other occasions (e.g. Freud, 1900, p. 598, 1916–7, p. 355, 1940, p. 145),
Freud combined both aspects of the pleasure-principle and referred to them in the
following manner:
When we further find that the activity of even the most highly developed mental apparatus
is subject to the pleasure principle, i.e., is automatically regulated by feelings belonging
to the pleasure–unpleasure series, we can hardly reject the further hypothesis that these
feelings reflect the manner in which the process of mastering stimuli takes place—certainly
in the sense that unpleasurable feelings are connected with an increase and pleasurable
feelings with a decrease of stimulus. (1915a, pp. 120–1, my italics)
Bowlby, adding to his already distorted and foreshortened reception of Freud’s
notions, misunderstands psychoanalysis again, believing it to be a science refer-
ring to observable behaviour. At all events, Bowlby argues exclusively within a
behavioural framework and reduces psychic processes and the representational
world—the real object of psychoanalysis—either to passive epiphenomena of bio-
logical processes with no influence whatsoever, or he disregards them totally. In
chapter 17 of his trilogy, where, in Fonagy’s (1999, p. 455) view, Bowlby describes
with relative clarity the representational system mediating and ensuring the continu-
ity of interpersonal behaviour, the decisive passage reads: ‘[H]ow a child gradually
builds up his own “internal world”’and ‘is busy constructing his working models …
are matters … that raise too many giant problems (and giant controversies) for it to
be sensible to attempt to deal with them here’ (p. 354).
Although Bowlby states his theory ‘in no way imperils the fruits of psycho-
analytic insight’ (1969, p. 234), when he adds that in ‘any case systematic research
has only just begun and little that is firm is yet known’(p. 354), one gets the impres-
sion that in his view previous psychoanalytic insights into the internal world are
non-systematic, unstable and therefore lacking scientific value.6
Sciences, Bowlby
argues, use the
6
In a 1981 interview Bowlby said that Melanie Klein was ‘totally unaware of the scientific method’, and
that ‘Anna Freud doesn’t know what science is about either’ (quoted in Grosskurth, 1986, p. 404).

10. 1538 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
…method of hypothesis, deductive prediction, and there can be no doubt that if psychoanalysis
is to attain full status as one of the behavioural sciences, it must add to its traditional method
the tried methods of the natural sciences. Whilst the historical method will always be a
principal method of the consulting room (as it continues to be in all branches of medicine),
for research purposes it can and should be augmented by the method of hypothesis, deductive
prediction, and test. (p. 9)
Considering that Bowlby devaluates psychoanalytic insights acquired in the
consulting room, it is understandable why he did not focus on the psychoanalytic
conceptualizations of ‘intrapsychic processes involved in the development of object
relations’ (Engel, 1971, p. 190) when answering the question how ‘these models
are built up and thenceforward bias perceptions and evaluation, how adequate and
effective for planning they become, how valid or distorted as representations they
are, and what conditions help or hinder their development’ (Bowlby, 1969, p. 354).
Yet, even if Bowlby had answered these questions, which he regarded as ‘matters
of great consequences for understanding the different ways in which attachment
behaviour becomes organised as children grow older’ (p. 354), and had he trans-
ferred his data into psychological terms and used his interpretations to contradict
psychoanalytic conceptualizations, his findings could never seriously question
psychoanalytic conceptualizations of early development. Knowledge is always
dependent on the method with which it was obtained. In this case it would imply
that direct observation of infants’ behaviour would be theoretically legitimated
as a method allowing one to decipher the infant’s inward life, and that Bowlby’s
methodological basis is metatheoretically linked with the psychoanalytic method.7
Once one abandons this metatheoretical linkage, Wolff’s statement is clearly valid:
namely that ‘infant observations’ remain ‘essentially irrelevant for psychoanalysis
as a theory of personal meanings and hidden motifs’ (1996, p. 369).
Bowlby, however, mentions the individual’s inward life only on few occasions.
The first remark touches on unconscious wishes:
To say that a wish is unconscious indicates that, in the person of whom it is said, a behavioural
system or integrate of systems having such and such a set-goal is active but that the person is
not aware of the fact (1969, p. 138).
As Bowlby’s concept of the unconscious follows ‘closely the concept of the
nonconscious as defined by cognitive theory’ (George and Solomon, 1999, p. 634),
and he explicitly states that ‘[t]he points of view not adopted are the dynamic and
economic’ (Bowlby, 1969, p. 14), it remains an open question as to why and how
wishes become and stay unconscious. To define repression as ‘deactivation of a
[biological] system’ in which ‘certain information of significance to the individuals
being systematically excluded from further processing’ (1980, p. 65), Bowlby does
not solve the problem. In spite of his statement that ‘the hypothesis of multiple
models, one of which is highly influential but relatively or completely unconscious,
is no more than a version, in different terms, of Freud’s hypothesis of a dynamic
7
The psychoanalytic method depends on language: ‘Nothing takes place in a psychoanalytic treatment
but an interchange of words between the patient and the analyst’ (Freud, 1916–7, p. 17).

11. 1539
ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
unconscious’ (1973, p. 239), his definitions are totally different from Freud’s view
on repression and the dynamic unconscious. In Freud’s conceptualization, repression
does not take place at the interface between representations and biology. Repression
operates within the representations themselves, and the dynamic unconscious is not
situated in the human’s biological nature, as Bowlby maintains, commenting that
the ‘environmental and organismic models described here as necessary parts of a
sophisticated biological control system are … none other than the “internal worlds”
of traditional psychoanalytic theory’.
In Freud’s view, both the internal world and the dynamic unconscious are not
of a biological nature, but have a representational character. Freud, for example,
states,
An instinct can never become an object of consciousness—only the idea that represents the
instinct can. Even in the unconscious, moreover, an instinct cannot be represented otherwise
than by an idea. If the instinct did not attach itself to an idea or manifest itself as an affective
state, we could know nothing about it. (1915c, p. 177; see also 1905a, pp. 165f., 1915a,
p. 121)
In the face of Bowlby’s equation of the individuals’‘internal worlds’and biological,
behavioural and controlling systems, it is difficult to uphold Mitchell’s claim that
Bowlby ‘was several steps ahead of his own time’ (1999, p. 85). It seems more
likely that Bowlby was more in agreement with pre-Freudian views of academic
psychology, limiting psychological nature only to what was conscious and assessing
everything that was not conscious to the biological. Freud, referring to Lipps, who
shared the same opinion, argues against the view of his contemporary academic
psychology, and states that ‘what is unconscious’ has ‘to be regarded as having the
full value of a psychical process’ (1900, p. 612; see also 1940, pp. 157f.), and adds
five years later ‘that what are “really psychically effective” are psychical processes
which are unconscious in themselves’ (1905a, p. 148). If one assigns the uncon-
scious to biology instead of to the ‘presentation of the thing alone [Sachvorstellung]’
(1915c, p. 201), one abandons psychoanalysis as an independent ‘psychical science’
(1940, p. 159).
The concepts of Bowlby’s followers
One could argue along with Fonagy (2001) and Bohleber (2002) that in the meantime
research in attachment has progressed from the description of behavioural systems to
the level of mental representations of attachment, which are no longer understood as
mere correspondences of real attachment experiences. ‘[R]epresentation of the self
with the attachment figure’ would now ‘include also fantasies and wishes about the
relationship’leading to an understanding of ‘representations as a mixture of external
perception and internal fantasies and affects’ (Bohleber, 2002, p. 806). Therefore,
‘one of the main psychoanalytical criticisms’would have been ‘assimilated’(p. 805).
One could add in support of Bohleber’s statement that in the meantime the term
‘unconscious’ is also used more extensively by attachment theorists (e.g. Diamond
and Blatt, 1999; Fonagy and Target, 1998; George and Solomon, 1999; Hesse and
Main, 1999; Levy and Blatt, 1999; Main, 2000; Silverman, 1998; Slade, 2000).

12. 1540 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
Apart from the fact that it cannot be established how far the dynamic uncon-
scious is understood as a biological or psychical entity, neither in Bohleber’s (2002)
paper nor in the articles of authors involved in this move to the level of representa-
tion is there any reference to fantasies and wishes being unconscious in a dynamical
sense. For instance, Bretherton and Munholland (1999), Crittenden (1990), Main
(1991) and Sroufe (1990, 1996) followed Bowlby’s notion of working models and
differentiated working models into four representational systems—these are models
pertaining to the nature of interactions with the attachment figure built up within the
first year and elaborated later, to representations of events relevant for attachment
which are encoded and stored, to autobiographical memories in which certain events
are connected because they relate to the preceding and current personal history and
the development of self-understanding, and to the understanding of psychological
peculiarities of other persons. Yet in these representational systems there is no place
for psychic phenomena which are unconscious in a dynamical sense.8
Nor is there any comprehensive discussion of the relationship between attach-
ment and Freud’s concept of anaclitic object relations which would differentiate the
former from the latter using well-founded arguments. On the contrary, one gets the
impression that for attachment-theorists Freud may never have written that in ‘early
infancy the individual’s … most important interest really is that the people he is
dependent on should not withdraw their loving care of him’ (1926, p. 146).
Moreover, in later conceptions of attachment theory the question of how an
external conflict—for instance, if the binding figure frustrates a wish for attach-
ment—is transformed into an internal conflict provoking defence mechanisms is
also left open. In substance the authors refer to ‘conflict behaviors—that is, behav-
iors believed to result from the simultaneous activation of incompatible systems’
(George and Solomon, 1999; Hesse and Main, 1999, p. 502; Main, 1999).
Tyson concludes that as a result of the ‘development into a theory more con-
cerned with interpersonal relations than with intrapsychic dynamics … attachment
theory lost the depth and complexity provided by a theory of unconscious conflict’
(2000, pp. 1047f.).
Gilmore’s (1990, p. 496) and Dowling’s (1985, p. 106) initial claims—quoted
at the beginning and with reference to Bowlby (1988), and to Adam’s (1982),
Delozier’s (1982), Hinde’s (1982), Marris’s (1982) and Parkes’s (1981) interpreta-
tions of Bowlby’s attachment theory—thus appear to apply also to the more recent
versions of attachment theory. The epistemological problems inherent in Bowlby’s
attachment theory have neither been discussed nor resolved, nor is there a reference
to a dynamic unconscious, an interaction of drive wishes and defence, to internal
conflicts or substitutive formations. It is not simply the fact that, in Bowlby’s
conceptualizations, ‘the ego’s capacity to create defenses that organize charac-
terological and symptomatic constructions as part of the developmental process’
does not constitute, as Fonagy (1999, pp. 451f.) would have it, a ‘cornerstone’
8
This is not surprising. For, as the attachment theorists George and Solomon note, ‘The “dynamic” or
overpowering aspects that are implicit to the psychoanalytic unconscious have been removed from
the attachment theory concept’ (1999, p. 633).

13. 1541
ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
of his trilogy. One might say the same for the works of Adam (1994), Ainsworth
(1991), Hinde and Stevenson-Hinde (1990) and Parkes (1993), published later. To
invalidate previous criticism of Bowlby’s conceptualizations (e.g. Engel, 1971;
A. Freud, 1960; Hanly, 1978; Kernberg, 1976, pp. 121f.; Rochlin, 1971; Roiphe,
1976) it is not sufficient to talk about ‘internal working model[s]’ (e.g. Bretherton,
1992, p. 767; Levy and Blatt, 1999, p. 546; Silverman, 1998, p. 268) instead of
‘working models’ (Bowlby, 1969, pp. 80ff.), or to accentuate Bowlby’s (1981,
p. 429; 1980, p. 55) term ‘representational models’ (e.g. Diamond and Blatt, 1999,
p. 429; George and Solomon, 1999, p. 663; Slade, 2000, p. 1151) or to substi-
tute them by the concept of ‘mental representations’ (e.g. Fonagy, 1999, p. 452;
Hesse and Main, 2000, p. 1108), and leaving Bowlby’s understanding of these
concepts as mere epiphenomena of biological processes untouched. By way of
example, Ainsworth, Cassidy, Cummings, Cicchetti, Main and Solomon, Marvin
and Stewart—all of whose papers assembled in Greenberg et al. (1990)—veer
towards the internal world of the child via the concept of working models. But
they do not discuss Bowlby’s basic tenets seriously, there is only a rudimentary
concept of defence, and nowhere in the book is there any attention given to the
vicissitudes of psychosexual development, to conflicts—such as those brought
about by changes in the anal phase—nor to the anxieties characteristic of the
phallic phase, and specific oedipal conflicts (see also Lilleskov, 1992).
Hence, Fonagy’s (1999) notion that the mutual misunderstandings between
attachment theory and psychoanalysis have been resolved and that psychoanalytic
criticism ought to be regarded as outdated is questionable. Differences between
scientific disciplines can be attributed neither to their objects of cognition nor to
their aims of cognition. They can only be put down to the methods with which
their objects are examined and to the manner in which they are conceptualized.
Therefore, arguments such as ‘It is a fundamental tenet of both theories that social
perception and social experience are distorted by expectations’ (2001, p. 158), both
theories ‘privilege the first years of life in their consideration of the relationship
between social environment and personality development’ (p. 159) and ‘assume
that early relationships provide the context within which certain critical psycho-
logical functions are acquired and developed’ (p. 164), both focus on a ‘specific
symbolic function’—that of ‘mentalization’ (p. 165)— or ‘both bodies of knowl-
edge are progressing towards the same end-point … a developmental understanding
of personality and psychological disorder’ (pp. 191f.) cannot suffice to resolve the
discrepancies between attachment theory and psychoanalysis.
In addition, as theoretical knowledge is not contained in single concepts but
in their systematic interrelations,9
Fonagy’s reference to Balint’s (1952) ‘primary
love’, Fairbairn’s (1952) ‘object seeking’, or Winnicott’s (1965) ‘ego related-
ness’—in Fonagy’s (2001, p. 162) view also conceptualized as an autonomous
need for a relationship—does not prove any similarity between attachment theory
9
This is probably one of the reasons why Freud reminded us ‘not to forget that … it is dangerous, not
only with men but also with concepts, to tear them from the sphere in which they have originated and
been evolved’ (1930a, p. 144).

14. 1542 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
and psychoanalytical theories. Without investigating whether there is a structural
similarity between attachment theory and the conceptual interrelations these
notions have in Balint’s, Fairbairn’s and Winnicott’s thinking, Fonagy’s assertion
merely points to the fact that attachment theorists and these authors use the same
empirical generalization. This indicates a similarity between a concept used in
attachment theory and concepts put forward by Balint, Fairbairn and Winnicott on
a phenomenological level, but not a conceptual compatibility of attachment theory
and the psychoanalytical theories of these authors.
It is not simply the fact that attachment theory and Freudian psychoanalysis
conceptualize differently the influence of expectations on social perception and
social experience, the relationship between social environment and personality
development in the first years of life, the connexion between early relationships
and the development of psychological functions and psychological disorders, and
other issues. These differences do not, as Fonagy believes, ‘boil down to relatively
few simple disagreements’ (2001, p. 1). On the contrary, they are—as Cortina and
Marrone point out—embedded in a ‘paradigm shift’ in that ‘attachment theory
proposes a completely new framework from which to understand clinical and
developmental phenomena that has traditionally been interpreted with concepts
of drives, libido, cathexis, fixation, regression, sublimation and so forth’ (2004,
p. 141).10
So it would rather seem to me that the opposite of Fonagy’s statement is true:
psychoanalytic criticism of attachment theory can only be regarded as being invali-
dated if either basic tenets and conceptualizations of Freudian psychoanalysis, or
those of attachment theory or those of both are misunderstood.
Concluding remarks
Almost half a century ago, Spitz summarized his criticism of Bowlby’s attachment
theory as follows:
When submitting new theories we should not violate the principle of parsimony in science by
offering hypotheses which in contrast to existing theory becloud the observational facts, are
oversimplified, and make no contribution to the better understanding of observed phenomena.
(1960, p. 94)
Thirty-five years later, Köhler diagnosed an ‘incompatibility [of the] concep-
tual frameworks’ of attachment theory and psychoanalysis (1995, p. 71; see
also Gullestad, 2001). From an epistemological viewpoint, human behaviour is
explained tautologically and is made a mere manifestation of an abstract idea
implanted in biology. One observes some kind of attachment behaviour and
10
If the same concepts are used in two theories with different frameworks, the concepts have not the same
meaning. For instance, in Freudian psychoanalysis mentalization—defined as ‘the capacity to think about
mental states in oneself and in others’ (Fonagy, 2000, p. 1129)—appears in the psychoanalytic process
as an interplay of transference, countertransference, and empathy (Zepf and Hartmann, 2002, 2004).
These concepts also relate to the dynamic unconscious which is excluded in attachment theory. Since, as
Altman nicely puts it, the ‘meaning of a concept … is a function of the network of concepts in which it is
embedded’ (1993, p. 86), mentalization has different meanings in both theories.

15. 1543
ATTACHMENT THEORY AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
concludes from this observation that there is a need to establish such a kind of
relationship, thus explaining the observation with a need which in turn is justified
by the observation. For instance, Krause observes ‘good, tender, thoughtful, and
friendly relations to fellow men’ (1998, pp. 42f.) and concludes from them that
there is a ‘motivational order’ to form such kinds of relationships. In inferring
‘bodily causes’ from ‘psychological entities’ (p. 15) these motivational orders
obtained via abstraction are materialized in animating nature. Based on a confusion
of real processes and processes of gaining knowledge these false materializations
of abstract ideas share the same tradition as the criticism on such procedures. I do
not want to repeat this criticism, but rather quote Thomä who criticized Schultz-
Hencke for substituting Freud’s drive concept by abstract categorical experiences
such as ‘retentive impulse-experience’ 40 years ago with the remark ‘that a sibling
neither lives according to categories nor does he experience them; he simply drops
his faeces under himself’ (1963/64, p. 102).
Bowlby’s comprehensive allusions to the behaviour of subhuman precur-
sors of human behaviour might perhaps be deserving to some extent. But the
general presumption that these behaviours are biologically designed to preserve
the species is, epistemologically speaking, just as unmaintainable as the equation
of mechanical operations, animal and human behaviour while ignoring their dif-
ferentia specifica.
The objections put forward in this paper can be deduced from Bowlby’s and
from the work of his followers without effort. Although there is an epistemolog-
ical and objective incompatibility of basic psychoanalytic tenets and attachment
theory, attachment concepts in varying formulations have been adopted in
psychoanalytic reasoning. Not forgetting that in psychoanalysis ‘in the world of
neuroses it is psychical reality which is the decisive kind’ (Freud, 1916–7, p. 368,
my italics), one ought to be surprised. With this concept Freud (1916–7, p. 368;
see also 1914a, p. 18) refers to the existence of unconscious fantasies as psychic
phenomena in an ontological sense and to their ‘reality value’ (1927, p. 31) in the
sense that they operate like real experiences (see Zepf et al., 2002). From here it
follows that a theory which omits these unconscious contents can hardly serve to
deepen psychoanalytic understanding of the representational world, of affective
regulation, of the therapeutic process and of the developmental origins of various
forms of psychopathology. How could psychoanalysis deepen its knowledge if it
became mixed up with concepts of a theory whose empirical subject Freud had
already conceptualized, a theory, in which not only the dynamic unconscious but
also the drive-concept—both belonging to the ‘Corner-stones of psychoanalytic
theory’ (Freud, 1923, p. 246)—are discarded? It is the significance of attach-
ment which should be integrated into the theoretical body of psychoanalysis to
support Freud’s concept of the ‘anaclitic type’ of object relationship with regard
to the defence of drive wishes. In my view it is precisely because the production
of the dynamic unconscious is motivated by the necessity to relate to objects
‘according to the anaclitic [attachment] type’, (Freud, 1927, pp. 23f.) in order to
avoid unpleasure, i.e. by a need for attachment, the concept of anaclitic object
relationships needs to be particularly stressed.

16. 1544 SIEGFRIED ZEPF
Translations of summary
Bindungstheorie und Psychoanalyse — Bemerkungen unter einem epistemologischen und einem
freudianischen Blickwinkel. Bowlbys Bindungstheorie und ihre neueren Versionen werden sowohl in
epistemologischer Hinsicht als auch hinsichtlich der Frage untersucht, inwieweit sich psychoanalytische
Konzepte in ihnen wiederfinden lassen. Es wird argumentiert, dass Bowlbys Fundierung der Bindungstheorie,
die auch in den späteren Konzepten nicht ernsthaft problematisiert wurde, wissenschaftlichen Ansprüchen
nicht genügen kann, dass die in der Psychoanalyse zentral stehenden Konzepte — z. B. das dynamische
Unbewusste, die inneren Konflikte, das Zusammenspiel vonTriebwünschen undAbwehr in der Herstellung von
Ersatzbildungen – entweder ignoriert oder nicht ausreichend diskutiert wurden bzw. werden. In diesem Licht
gesehen, verkehrt sich Fonagys Feststellung, dass die psychoanalytische Kritik an der Bindungstheorie auf
wechselseitigen Missverständnissen beruhte und in der Zwischenzeit substanzlos geworden ist, in ihr Gegenteil:
Die psychoanalytische Kritik kann nur dann als überholt angesehen werden, wenn entweder Grundannahmen
der Freudschen Psychoanalyse, der Bindungstheorie oder beider Theorien missverstanden werden.
Teoría del apego y psicoanálisis. Algunos comentarios desde un punto de vista epistemológico y
freudiano. Se examinan la teoría del apego de Bowlby y algunas de sus versiones mas recientes desde un
punto de vista epistemológico y se valora si están en sintonía con los conceptos centrales del psicoanálisis
freudiano. Se sostiene que los principios básicos de la teoría del apego de Bowlby, que posteriores teóricos
del apego nunca cuestionaron seriamente, no están en conformidad a los estándares científicos, y que
conceptos psicoanalíticos como el inconsciente dinámico, los conflictos internos, la interacción de los
deseos pulsionales y el papel de la defensa en el establecimiento de formaciones sustitutivas no solo son
ignorados sino que son tratados con insuficiente profundidad. A la luz de esto, la afirmación de Fonagy
de que la crítica psicoanalítica a la teoría del apego surgió de un malentendido mutuo y que debe ser hoy
considerada como obsoleta, es revertida: la crítica psicoanalítica solo puede ser considerada obsoleta si los
principios básicos del psicoanálisis freudiano, de la teoría del apego o ambos son malentendidos.
Théorie de l’attachement et psychanalyse. Quelques remarques d’un point de vue épistémologique et
freudien. La théorie de l’attachement de Bowlby et certaines de ses versions plus récentes sont examinées
d’un point de vue épistémologique et soumises à la question de savoir si elles sont compatibles avec
les concepts centraux de la psychanalyse freudienne. Il est montré que les principes fondamentaux de
Bowlby concernant la théorie de l’attachement (que les théoriciens ultérieurs de l’attachement n’ont jamais
sérieusement remis en question) ne sont pas conformes aux standards scientifiques, et que des aspects de
la théorie psychanalytique comme l’inconscient dynamique, les conflits internes, l’interaction des désirs
pulsionnels et le rôle des défenses dans la mise en place de formations substitutives sont soit ignorés, soit
traités sans être suffisamment approfondis. A la lumière de ces remarques, l’assertion de Fonagy selon
laquelle la critique psychanalytique de la théorie de l’attachement provient de malentendus mutuels et
devrait de nos jours être considérée comme dépassée, doit être inversée : la critique psychanalytique ne peut
être considérée comme dépassée que si les principes fondamentaux de le psychanalyse freudienne ou ceux
de la théorie de l’attachement sont tous deux mal compris.
Teoria dell’attaccamento e psicoanalisi – Considerazioni da un punto di vista epistemologico e
freudiano. La teoria dell’attaccamento di Bowlby e le sue più recenti versioni vengono riesaminate da
un punto di vista epistemologico, e si valuta se esista o meno una corrispondenza fra questa teoria e i
concetti della psicoanalisi freudiana. Viene proposta l’idea che i concetti fondamentali alla base della teoria
bowlbiana, mai seriamente messi in questione dai più recenti teorici dell’attaccamento, non siano conformi
agli standard scientifici. Concetti psicoanalitici quali inconscio dinamico, conflitti interiori, interazione
dei desideri pulsionali e ruolo delle difese nello stabilire formazioni sostitutive, vengono o ignorati o non
trattati con il dovuto approfondimento. Alla luce di tale constatazione, l’affermazione di Fonagy a proposito
delle critiche psicoanalitche nei confronti della teoria dell’attaccamento – e cioè che sono il risultato di
fraintendimenti reciproci e dovrebbero oggi essere considerate obsolete - viene capovolta. Infatti le critiche
psicoanalitiche possono essere considerate obsolete solo se i concetti fondamentali della teoria freudiana o
quelli della teoria dell’attaccamento, o entrambi, sono fraintesi.
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