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All Psychoanalytic Theories Agree generally that the beginnings of neurotic development must be sought in the vicissitudes of childhood growth. They differ in their emphasis on the particular factors in the child which are involved. The Freudian focuses on the instinctive psychosexual tendencies; the Adlerian on feelings of inferiority arising in relation to the child's own condition, or to its place in the family; the Sullivanian on developmental modes of communicating and relating to others; the Horneyan on childhood attitudes developed in relation to distorted parental attitudes.
Within the Horney theory, however, relatively little attention has been paid to childhood development as such. This may be said without in any way detracting from either the validity of its concepts or its eminent clinical and therapeutic value as a holistic viewpoint. While using this theory as the best possible explanatory approach to neurotic development, I feel that it contains a gap in both its theoretical and clinical application to the earlier phases of life.
That this may be so is understandable for several reasons. Horney was not primarily a child analyst; her writings do not give the impression of being based on extensive, direct observations of children. They contain few clinical cases of children in therapy, whereas they are replete with examples of adults. Although there is frequent discussion of the childhood conditions which give rise to the neurotic personality, these are usually interpolations from the adult patients. For instance, she states: “… in examining the childhood histories of a great number of neurotic persons, I have found …”1
In the second place, the nature of the theory itself would militate against particularizing the child. Since it is predominantly concerned with the total structure of the neurotic personality and its evolution in the individual, childhood development is viewed within this framework—which could equally well apply to the adult and the child.