Meetings of the New York Psychoanalytic Society

November 24, 1970. LATE ADOLESCENCE: DEVELOPMENTAL AND CLINICAL CONSIDERATIONS. Brill Memorial Lecture. Samuel Ritvo, M.D.

Adolescence normally spans six to eight years. In its closing phase the now biologically mature individual takes self-defining steps toward an identity in his society. Particularly important are identifications with parents as sexually and work-active persons. The subsidized, dependent student group is most affected by social conditions that prolong late adolescence.

Crises arise when latent vulnerabilities of the ego become manifest in the face of the demand for integration and consolidation. The issues of the period are the heterosexual approach, homosexual concerns, and self and societal definition. Drugs, contraception, mobility, instantaneous communication, the nuclear threat, and the prolongation of adolescence in our technological society provide conditions for kaleidoscopic shifts and modifications in the expression of basic psychological conflicts.

In early adolescence, reawakened pregenital urges threaten Oedipal and preoedipal objects. Consequent anxiety motivates efforts to loosen infantile object ties. The return of this object libido to the self and the ego results in heightened narcissism, manifested in bodily preoccupations or, when externalized and projected, in quickly formed and broken attachments based on idealizations. Later, with increasing need for genital gratification, reality assumes a greater power. Reality directed activity increases the possibility of aggression upon the new object, as well as of acting upon Oedipal and preoedipal fantasies. Anaclitic elements, clinging demands, or when the object is regarded as a possession or embodies ideals for the self, further complicate the relationship.

However, the object permits identifications and the release of neutralized energies and thus serves as an organizer for action and work, and strengthens the sense of purpose as the mother once did. Normally, passive