The Influence of Psychoanalytic Developmental Psychology

Review of Burton N. Seitler and Kimberly S. Kleinman, Eds., Essays from Cradle to Couch: In Honor of the Psychoanalytic Developmental Psychology of Sylvia Brody (Astoria, NY: International Psychoanalytic Books, 2017), ISBN: 978-0-9980833-3-9, 424 pages, paperback, $35.

This volume consists of 13 separate essays representing contributions to what the editors aptly call “psychoanalytic developmental psychology” in honor of Sylvia Brody, a developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst. Dr. Brody was a pioneer in the field of direct observation of children from infancy through childhood and adolescence in longitudinal studies that yielded an enormous amount of new information about development and its interferences. The authors and the topics of their essays are a diverse assortment that taken together represent the latest findings in this important field.

This volume will be of interest to psychohistorians for several reasons. Theories of child development have always been important in the understanding of biographies, and the new advances in understanding attachment, separation, mentalization, and intersubjectivity offer three new vistas in particular for the psychobiographer. First, early parental loss seems to play an important role not only in the lives of many historical figures but also in the understanding of large groups as well. Second, the history of childhood has been of great interest to psychohistorians since Lloyd deMause’s seminal work. The volume illustrates the ways we can understand the importance of even the smallest interactions between mother and child in the earliest months of life. Third, attachment theory and intersubjectivity in the mother-child dyad offer the pos-

Page 106

sibility of a new understanding of large group processes in analogy with early development. The new developmental research and the newer theoretical emphases offer the psychohistorian new opportunities for large-group research.

It is impossible in a short review to do justice to the 13 essays, each of which merits its own extensive discussion. However, the prospective reader deserves some idea of what is in store. Writing in the Anna Freud tradition, Kerry Kelly and Jack Novick lead off with a summary of their innovative work on parenting in the context of what they term a “dual-track model of self-regulation.” Beatrice Beebe describes her method of brief mother-infant treatment involving video feedback of microanalysis of face to face mother-infant interactions. She offers two detailed case studies of this method. Her research has also been influential in suggesting new avenues for the treatment of adults. These two chapters are worth the price of the book, but there is more to come.

Laurel Silber offers a case of transmitted intergenerational trauma from a relational and intersubjective perspective. The Argentinian child analyst Eva Rotenberg offers a Winnicottian approach to subjectivity and the integration of the ego. Monisha Nayer-Akhtar and Sumedha Ariely follow with an empirical study of attachment patterns in institutionalized children from South Asia. This essay serves as a caution that our theoretical concepts can easily be culture-bound. Following this theme, Phyllis Ackman describes a successful consultation to the staff of a social service agency serving immigrant Mexican families in East Harlem. Ann Smolen also uses attachment theory in her investigation of the treatment of homeless mothers and their infants. Joseph Schaller describes his work with foster children utilizing concepts from relational psychoanalysis.

Martin Silverman, a senior child and adult psychoanalyst, writes about two cases of behavior disorders and his therapy with both mother and child. Both children suffered forms of maternal loss. Corinne Masur continues the important topic of maternal loss and the question of whether very young children can mourn. She offers an examination of mourning at various stages of childhood. Rosa Spagnolo offers a case study of a very disturbed young adult and the use of music in the successful therapy of her patient. She describes the use of music as analogous to the mother’s attunement to the infant’s unverbalized needs. Michael O’Loughlin describes how he works with children and the influence both of his own early

Page 107

 life experiences and Lacanian theory. The last chapter by co-editor Burton Seitler concerns the dubious usefulness of the medical approach to symptoms considered to be attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). He offers a case of the successful psychological treatment of a child with ADHD symptoms.

This volume thus constitutes a broad and extremely rich account of the latest in psychoanalytic developmental psychology’s contribution to theory and practice in a wide variety of settings with diverse populations. I have only a minor quibble to offer as criticism. I would have appreciated a more extensive introduction to the diverse essays. In addition to the list of Dr. Brody’s publications, I would have benefitted from a more extensive description of how Brody’s work fits into the broader field of child psychoanalysis. Several of the authors described how Brody’s work influenced them, but a more extensive description at the outset would have been helpful. In addition, because of the diversity of the theoretical influences on the various authors, a more extensive description of the history of the newer theoretical advances in the light of what has gone before might have offered a more comprehensible context for these quite theoretically diverse offerings.

Nonetheless, I would recommend this volume to both beginning students and experienced hands in psychohistory. The field of child development offers continuing insight into the role of infancy, childhood, and adolescence not only into individual adult behavior but into large-group life as well.

Page 108