Psychoanalysis, Development, and the Life Cycle

This issue of JAPA focuses on psychic development and the life cycle. It demonstrates the continuing psychoanalytic concern with various aspects of the emerging inner world of the young child and the ways in which this influences later psychic functioning. Papers included cover venues ranging from the consulting rooms of child analysts to the laboratories of empirical researchers: the places where important work is elucidating these matters. Also included are the clinical challenges faced by the analyst of adults who turns to developmental theories to find meaning; in doing so an analyst risks confusion, as concepts constructed to explain the psychology of the young child may lose specificity and meaning when applied to the psychology of the adult. Finally, included here as well are examples of the ways that theories derived from child analysis or empirical developmental research can be used, and extended to adult phenomena that may be at least descriptively similar to childhood ones.

The present edition of JAPA is notable in several respects. For one, child psychoanalysis has a voice. In her report of the psychoanalysis of a young girl, Yanof defies those skeptical about the process of child analysis, while at the same time challenging us to reconsider certain central developmental theories. The clinical material of Aruffo, Ibarra, and Strupp is a welcome demonstration of the ways in which child psychoanalysis can and must challenge current pediatric and psychiatric notions about certain childhood syndromes. Gilmore similarly demonstrates ways in which psychoanalytic treatment of a child, in conjunction with psychopharmacological therapy, can address the core disturbance in ego integration associated with the diagnosis of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder.

Of particular importance in this volume is the focus on needed dialogue between psychoanalysis and attachment theory. The language