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The author is Professor of Psychology at the University of Pittsburg and has written this text-book primarily for social workers, teachers, public health nurses and all others engaged in child guidance work.
The material covers all phases of child development with particular reference to the problems met by the professional worker. The approach is mildly dynamic and based on the principles encompassed in the term “mental hygiene”. Psychoanalytic explanations are presented for some of the material but the author is unable to accept them in the major conclusions. It is frequently the exceptional case where psychoanalytic theory is acceptable with some reservations to the author but not the usual example of a given disorder or syndrome. She does not, however, share the fundamental prejudice of academic psychologists towards psychoanalysis.
The explanations given are usually the generally accepted ones in the world of social work and school, and are accordingly superficial. The view that in some infants severe emotional disturbances may result from early deprivation of the oral pleasures is mentioned briefly with more emphasis being placed on the principle of conditioning. The relationship of early anal function with later personality development is minimized. The strong ambivalence, a psychological characteristic in children, cannot be accepted by the author in toto although she can see the presence of some. The belief is expressed that in her experience some children do not go through the Oedipus (or Electra) situation and that in general the child's preference for a parent is determined by factors other than the “sex instint per se”.
The recommendations as to therapy are generally sound and follow the pattern of mental hygiene and child guidance clinics. The environment is overly stressed as it so commonly is by psychologists. The wrong attitudes of parents, foster parents, and teachers towards children are