The ideas presented in this book are the outcome of years of conducting psychotherapy and psychoanalysis with adults and children, working with mother–infant groups, and studying infant development. Working with mother–infant pairs as an observer, rather than as a therapist, is for a psychoanalyst what time travel would be for an archeologist, albeit infinitely more accessible. One is privileged to observe the early relationship in statu nascendi, as it unfolds, whereas reconstructing it in psychoanalysis is a slow, complex process, burdened by false starts, doubts and painstaking (sometimes painful) examination of the counter-transference. Observing “normal” infants in their natural environment allows one also to appreciate the rich variety of infant personalities and their impact on the caregivers.

The book examines the clinical implications of innate developmental individuality. The authors present an outline of the interdependence of the developmental sequences: perceptual, motor, cognitive and emotional. The book examines the clinical and theoretical issues, as well as examining some recent advances in neuro-behavioral sciences.