The Interpersonal World of the Child: A View from Psychoanalysis and Developmental Psychology: Daniel N. Stern, M.D.,  Basic Books, New York.

In his most recent book, The Interpersonal World of the Child, Dr. Stern advances the understanding of child development from analogy with mythology and psychopathology to a new formulation derived from careful observation of the live infant. This is not to say that earlier theorists did not observe the infant. They did, but not with the new experimental methods used by Dr. Stern. One could say that he deals with microscopic changes in infant behavior, whereas theirs was a view of gross behavior. He also points out that their theories came from the reconstruction of the recollections of the adult patient and the interpretations of the analyst. This Dr. Stern calls the “clinical infant,” which he distinguishes from the “observed infant,” who is observed on the spot when the action is happening. He states that “the ‘observed infant’ contributes capacities which can be readily witnessed. The ‘clinical infant’ contributes certain subjective experiences that are fundamental and common features of social life.” He believes there should be an interface between the two. This clarifies Dr. Stern's frame of reference and his conclusions.

The main concern of the book is with the origin of the sense of self in the infant, and it asks “What kind of a sense of self might exist in the preverbal infant?” The basic assumption is that “some senses of the self do exist long prior to self awareness and language.” He describes four main stages of the senses of the self: the emergent self, the core self, the subjective self, and the verbal self. He does not see these as distinct phases but one merging with the other as it develops and continuing together throughout life. This is in contrast to the distinct phases such as the oral, anal, phallic, trust, autonomy, autistic, and symbiotic phases of Freud, Erickson, and Mahler.

In this scheme of development the sense of the emergent self spans the first 2 months of life. Ingenious experiments are cited that reveal that even 2-day-old infants i