Narcissism and Female Gender Identity: A Reformulation*

Until recently, a discussion of the narcissistic development of the female child would have been subsumed within a discussion of the phases of psychosexual development. In 197123, Heinz Kohut postulated a separate line of development for “narcissistic libido” independent of “object libido” and thereby offered a radically new perspective from which to consider this psychological development. Narcissism has, however, been as controversial an issue in psychoanalysis as has the psychological development of the female. Furthermore, among the various studies of female psychological development, the role of narcissism has been subject to the most frequent and extensive revisions.

Freud's “introduction” of the concept of narcissism8 and his several discussions of female psychosexual development7,9,10,11 provided Deutsch5 and others (e.g., Bonaparte3, Greenacre15, and Reich30) with the framework upon which they elaborated. Later refinements of the theory of narcissism were proposed by Hartmann17 Jacobson19 and many others. Concurrently, a literature critical of Freud's view of psychosexual development of the young girl appeared. These contributions have been aptly summarized from a historical perspective by Fliegel6 and more recently, among others, by Barglow and Schaefer1. The concept of narcissism has also been subjected to a critical review by Kernberg21,22, Kohut23,24, Pulver29 and Stolorow and Lachmann.36 These analysts have suggested wide ranging revisions in