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A boy of six, an only child, moved with his parents from a small village to a suburban community near a large city. Coincidentally the child's nurse had to leave. These two changes initiated a troubled period in the child's life, marked by restless sleep, dawdling, rebellious outbursts of temper, and especially by acute anxiety about the traffic which gathered around the station each evening as the suburban wives assembled to meet their homecoming husbands. This anxiety was so intense that often the child could not be induced to drive to the station with his mother, although he would go on solitary drives with either parent over less frequented roads. On these occasions too, after a certain length of time he would exhibit some anxiety and eagerness to get close to his home again.
His uneasiness included trips from the suburb to the city. This uneasiness was most manifest when he was with his father, to whom he openly complained about the traffic, admitting his fear of it. Occasionally he specifically said that he did not want to go to town and that he was fearful of the tall buildings, in which at the same time he had an intense interest.
While observing these mild symptoms with some slight concern, the parents also noted that the child had focused some of his anxiety on his penis. On one occasion he had been observed kneeling beside the bathroom scales, resting his penis on the platform and endeavoring to weigh it. On another, he had been demonstrating all of his old and familiar possessions to an uncle who for the first time was visiting him in his new home. "This," he said, "is my clay, and this is my ball, and this is my engine," etc., going through a long list as though to convince them both that everything he prized had been brought to his new home with him. Then suddenly he