1. On the basis of material presented, it would appear that the psychiatrist in private practice may increase his therapeutic success and add materially to the general fund of medical knowledge if he takes advantage of his assets and trains himself, as an integral part of his therapeutic procedure, to make and record the kind of careful observation required of the research scientist.2. In so doing, he will find himself more and more in the rôle of the doctor of the family or the social group and an active participant in such public health programs as are focussed on preventive medicine. The cure of one person may mean the elimination of a focus of infection, and the prevention of illness in one or many persons more or less intimately associated with this patient.3. The busy psychiatrist may well select from among the many who consult him those who are parents of young children, or in positions of authority that give them control over the destiny of groups. But every therapist who studies the patient in his family and cultural setting, and looks at him as a part of a series of patients with similar complaints, will make his contribution to research.Abstract Teaser