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The simple game of peek-a-boo runs through a dazzling, complex course before surrendering its psychological functions to the more advanced game of hide-and-seek. This paper reports nursery observations of the normal developmental sequence of peek-a-boo, some aberrant forms of the game during infancy and toddlerhood, and its pathological persistence into adolescence and adulthood.
Despite the ubiquity of the peek-a-boo game and the window it offers into the mind of the child — the development of the drives, protodefensive activity, mastery, exploration, reality testing, and object relations — the peek-a-boo game has attracted the attention of academic psychologists rather than that of psychoanalysts. There are only two major analytic articles solely about peek-a-boo, and both are by Kleeman (1967, 1973). Drawing his conclusions mainly from the longitudinal observations of one child, Kleeman offers a survey of the overall significance of this game in early development. My approach is narrower, focusing on peek-a-boo as an indicator and facilitator of the child's mastery of separation during the phases of separation-individuation: the child's renunciation and memorialization of the primary object.
Peek-a-boo is an extension of yet earlier play. Mothers elicit smiles from their babies by moving into the child's field of vision and making a sound with a rising intonation. At the beginning of mother-initiated peek-a-boo, the smiling response is the focus for both mother and child. Once anchored, the image of the mother becomes available for losing and refinding. The earliest age I have observed peek-a-boo is 16 weeks. This early passive peek-a-boo is entirely structured by the mother.