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In her latest book, Anna Freud revisits the forgotten areas of normal childhood and development and abnormal difficulties encountered in this process. As in her classic book on The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense, Anna Freud again makes a major contribution to psychoanalytic theory and technique.
Leaning heavily on her clinical experience, Anna Freud stresses the necessity to combine observation of overt behavioral patterns with psychoanalytic insights. In her words: “Observations of the surface and the depth complement each other.”
Anna Freud describes in detail the differences and similarities between psychoanalytic treatment of adults and children. The main point of distinction is the concept of normal growth. Abnormality in adults is related to fixation and repression. In childhood, however, growth and development proper are the crucial issue. The specific phases of libidinal growth represent innumerable problems. The maturational sequences of ego do not unfold in accordance with a precise master plan. Each individual follows his own course; thus, some developmental lines become necessary before one can establish diagnostic clues.
Anna Freud suggests such a “developmental line,” leading from infantile dependency toward emotional self-reliance and adult object relationships. It starts with 1) biological unity between mother and infant, 2) the part-object, anaclitic relationship, 3) object constancy, 4) the ambivalent, pre-oedipal, anal-sadistic stage, 5) object centered phallic oedipal phase, 6) the post-oedipal latency period, 7) preadolescent regression to ambivalence,