This paper is addressed to pediatricians to acquaint them with their responsibility for the prevention of psychosis. Some degree of psychosis in childhood is common, but can only be diagnosed when the child 'organizes along a certain defensive line which becomes recognizable as a disease entity'.

The mental health of an individual is determined during the earliest phase of development. It depends on the mother's 'devotion', 'her sensitive and active adaptation to the infant's needs which at the beginning are absolute'. Psychosis occurs when the mothering has been defective from the beginning and has produced in the child distortions in emotional development before the child has become 'a whole person capable of total relationships with whole persons'. Klein and others have developed this theory for depressive and paranoid psychoses; Winnicott attempts to do so for schizoid states and schizophrenia.