Melitta Sperling discusses the psychodynamics of neurotic sleep disturbances in children, illustrating each clinical picture with case material. Severe sleep disturbance occurring in early infancy, not due to any discoverable physical cause, is attributable to rejection and neglect by the mother. It is an ominous symptom, foreshadowing probable later psychotic disturbance. Acute sleep disturbance often precedes the outbreak of a severe neurosis or psychosis. Nightmares, night terrors and sleepwalking are traceable to the Oedipal conflict. The dynamics of the nightmare is comparable to a phobia in which there is projection of aggressive