This is an important text that synthesises diverse literatures and theories on infant development into a coherent framework that illuminates the essence of infancy for all those who have infants, study infants, teach about infancy, make policy with respect to infant welfare, and work medically or therapeutically with mothers and their infants. It brings together in one volume the principal theories of infant development, beginning with Freud's vision of the Oedipal infant, moving through the post-Freudian conceptualizations of the infant of Anna Freud, Melanie Klein, and the British...

Psychoanalysis has moved a long way from the techniques of classical psychoanalysis but these changes have not been understood or disseminated to the wider community. Even university scholars and students of psychology have an archetypal view of the original form of psychoanalysis and do not appreciate that major changes have occurred. This book commences with a detailed outline of the origins of psychoanalysis and an explanation of key terms, which are often misinterpreted. The second chapter examines the changes that have occurred in theorising and practice over the past 120 years and...