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E. James Anthony preceded his opening comments by introducing Albert J. Solnit, the chairman of the first panel in this series of three on the title theme. Solnit concisely referred to the previous panel on Infancy and Childhood and paid tribute to Margaret Mahler's contributions to our understanding of this early phase in development. Anthony then introduced the panel and noted with pleasure that in all three presentations, theory and practice are interwoven. He indicated that in his experience as an analyst he is always sensible of some refinement of individuation proceeding in himself as he analyzes, and that one's identity as an analyst undergoes many vicissitudes over the years of practice. He felt sure that the different facets of theory presented by this panel would enrich our view of this significant developmental period.
This systematic analytic examination of the life cycle should help to pool a great deal of knowledge generally kept partitioned. Moreover, it has two further advantages: it enables analysts to look at a particular process, e.g., separation-individuation, against the background of different segments of developmental time, as well as to scrutinize a particular stage of development, e.g., adolescence, in terms of the process. These two perspectives can fruitfully complement each other, but there are some built-in problems to be considered. A developmental phase, such as adolescence, with its hyperfluidity, might not provide the optimal time for investigating phenomena in depth. Anna Freud has spoken not only of "our bewilderment when faced with all the intricacies of the