Normal Child and Adolescent Development: A Psychodynamic Primer

365 Pages·2013·2.86 MB·English

by  Karen J Gilmore

Normal Child and
Adolescent Development
A Psychodynamic Primer
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Normal Child and
Adolescent Development
A Psychodynamic Primer
by
Karen J. Gilmore, M.D.
Pamela Meersand, Ph.D.
Washington, DC
London, England
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gilmore, Karen
Normal child and adolescent development : a psychodynamic primer / by Karen Gilmore,
Pamela Meersand. — 1st ed.
p. ; cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-58562-436-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
I. Meersand, Pamela. II. American Psychiatric Publishing. III. Title.
[DNLM: 1. Adolescent Development. 2. Child Development. 3. Adolescent Psychology.
4. Child Psychology. WS 105]
RJ503
618.92(cid:2)8914—dc23
2013010863
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A CIP record is available from the British Library.
Contents
About the Authors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .ix
Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xiii
Video Guide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xv
1 A Psychodynamic
Developmental Orientation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2 Infancy:
Parenthood, the Mother-Infant Relationship,
and the Mind of the Infant. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
3 The Toddler:
Early Sense of Self and Gender, Rapprochement,
Libidinal Object Constancy, and
Superego Precursors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4 The Oedipal Phase and Emerging Capacities:
Language, Imagination, Play, Mentalization, and
Self-Regulation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
5 The Oedipal Phase:
Psychosexual Development,
Oedipal Complex and Constellation, and
Oedipal Phase Contributions to Mental Life. . . . . . . . . 105
6 The Latency Phase:
Cognitive Maturation, Autonomy,
Social Development, and Learning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
7 Preadolescence:
Bodily Challenges, Changing Relationships,
and the Transition to the Teen Years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
8 Early and Mid-Adolescence:
The Importance of the Body, Sexuality, and
Individuation, the Role of Action, and the
Special Problems of the Teen Years. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
9 Late Adolescence:
Identity, Sexuality, Autonomy, and Superego Formation
in the Late Teens and Early Twenties. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
10 The Odyssey Years:
Emerging Adults on the Path to Adulthood . . . . . . . . . 283
11 The Role of Developmental Thinking
in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
Video Access: www.appi.org/Gilmore
About the Authors
Karen J. Gilmore, M.D., is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Columbia Uni-
versity College of Physicians and Surgeons, and Senior Consultant, Colum-
bia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research. She is in
private practice in Manhattan.
Pamela Meersand, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Psychology, Department
of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and
Director, Child Division, Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic
Training and Research. She is in private practice in Manhattan.
Disclosure: The authors affirm that they have no financial interests or affiliations that present or could
appear to present a conflict of interest with regard to the content and publication of this book.
vii
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Preface
A
s teachers of human development to psychiatric residents, psychology doc-
toral students, and psychoanalytic candidates for over a decade, we have been
faced with the absence of accessible literature that presents a comprehensive
picture of mental development, informed by contemporary research and psy-
chodynamic thinking. Although there are excellent texts from the 1990s about
theory (e.g., Tyson and Tyson 1990) and about the broader psychology of
development (Gemelli 1996), these perforce do not offer a twenty-first cen-
tury integration of recent findings in the psychodynamic literature and psy-
chology research that have introduced new ideas, new data, and even a new
developmental phase (see Chapter 10). Moreover, there has always been a
dearth of readable literature that presents an overview of development as a dy-
namic interaction of the growing mind (including the unconscious mind), the
maturing body, and the evolving demands of environment. Observing our stu-
dents’ struggle to “pull it all together,” we felt the need for a straightforward
primer that gives the reader a picture of how development unfolds as a com-
plex transactional process progressing through the first three decades of life,
retaining both individuality and universality.
As our students labored to envision an organic process of development
that was infinitely diverse and yet comprehensible as a coherent set of uni-
versal propositions, they educated us as to what was needed to synthesize
their thinking while maintaining their receptivity to new ideas. Even as we
grapple with current controversies about concepts such as developmental
phases and the importance of past experience in present-day functioning,
the educational value and usefulness of such a picture for the mental health
clinician seem irrefutable to us. For these reasons, we are grateful to the gen-
erations of students whose observations, ideas, and challenges helped us
realize this project with confidence in its heuristic merit.
Our conviction of the project’s value also grows from our belief that
understanding development is a building block of clinical thinking. In every
encounter with a patient, a clinician with a developmental education can better
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