Attachment and clinical work with children

International Forum of Psychoanalysis, 2010

Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 1989

Recent research on infant development is reviewed to consider its implications for psychodynamic theory and practice. To address the question of the importance of early experiences for development, research on continuities and discontinuities in development, temperament, motivational systems in infancy, affect development and regulation, development of the sense of self, and infant-caregiver attachment are reviewed. Two major implications emerge, both emphasizing the need for more complexities in our conceptualizations. First, research on infant development underscores the importance of context in development and cautions about the limits of reductionistic thinking and theories. Second a major paradigmatic shift away from the fixation-regression model of psychopathology and development is indicated. A new model that better fits available data is proposed instead. In this continuous construction model, there is no need for regression, and ontogenetic origins of psychopathology are no longer necessarily tied to specific critical or sensitive periods in development. Implications for psychodynamic treatment are also described.

Drawing on concepts from ethology, cybernetics, information processing, developmental psychology, and psychoanalysts, John Bowlby formulated the basic tenets of the theory. He thereby revolutionized our thinking about a child's tie to the mother and its disruption through separation, deprivation, and bereavement. Mary Ainsworth's innovative methodology not only made it possible to test some of Bowlby's ideas empirically hut also helped expand the theory itself and is responsible for some of the new directions it is now taking. Ainsworth contributed the concept of the attachment figure as a secure base from which an infant can explore the world. In addition, she formulated the concept of maternal sensitivity to infant signals and its role in the development of infant-mother attachment patterns.

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2015

Psychoanalytic theories have always tried to imagine the baby. We wonder, while listening to adults, what were they like as children, or as infants? Who was their mother and how did she care for them? Our ideas about the baby, its mother and the kind of loving care that we imagine will best support development have shifted over the decades, reflecting the multiple psychoanalytic cultures that now co-exist. For many years, an imagined infant, seen through the lens of adult experience, outweighed the evidence of behavioral observation in psychoanalytic theories. This was the case for cognitive psychology as well. In Before Speech (1979), Bullowa remembers that as late as her "medical training" the infant was believed to be born unable to speak or see; scientists were slow to notice that the baby communicates long before it can talk. In her words, "Of course most mothers know otherwise but scientists and other 'experts' haven't always taken them seriously" (p. 1). I do believe mothers experience something of the innate capacity for communication observable at birth, although they also understand the infant's self emerges over the first weeks and months. Perhaps science and psychoanalytic theory were imbedded in fantasies of early relational experience, notably ignoring the infant's perception and contribution, a way of becoming known. Cognitive science shifted, and psychoanalysis followed when the study of how communication begins was not limited to language development, and instead included the wonderful range of non-verbal communication that is described by the authors. The subtleties and complexities of non-verbal communication are central to their work and the impact of infant research on psychoanalytic theory and practice. An excellent review of the breadth of current understanding of infant capacities is included in Part I. We now know so much about how infants make sense of the world and how they participate and communicate in the relationships that sustain them. Findings from infant cognitive, social, and perceptual developmental research have changed the game of psychoanalytic theory building and Beebe and Lachmann translate these changes by documenting the construction of self and relationship in pre-verbal infancy.

ED209: Lifespan Development - Fall, 2020

Attachment theory has a complex history, both positive and negative. This paper focuses on both. ̔ An attachment is a tie based on the need for safety, security and protection. This need is paramount in infancy and childhood, when the developing individual is immature and vulnerable. The infants instinctively attach to their carers̕ , .

The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 2019

Tremblay RE, Barr RG, Peters RDeV, …

Educational and Child Psychology, 2010