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Melanie Klein was an Austrian-British author and psychoanalyst known for her work in child analysis. She was the primary figure in the development of object relations theory. Klein suggested that pre-verbal existential anxiety in infancy catalyzed the formation of the unconscious, which resulted in the unconscious splitting of the world into good and bad idealizations. In her theory, how the child resolves that split depends on the constitution of the child and the character of nurturing the child experiences. The quality of resolution can inform the presence, absence, and/or type of distresses a person experiences later in life.
Object relations theory is a school of thought in psychoanalytic theory and psychoanalysis centered around theories of stages of ego development. Its concerns include the relation of the psyche to others in childhood and the exploration of relationships between external people, as well as internal images and the relations found in them. Adherents to this school of thought maintain that the infant's relationship with the mother primarily determines the formation of their personality in adult life. Attachment is the bedrock of the development of the self, i.e. the psychic organization that creates one's sense of identity.
Otto Friedmann Kernberg is an Austrian-born American psychoanalyst and professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine. He is most widely known for his psychoanalytic theories on borderline personality organization and narcissistic pathology. In addition, his work has been central in integrating postwar ego psychology with Kleinian and other object relations perspectives. His integrative writings were central to the development of modern object relations, a school within modern psychoanalysis.
In development psychology, Melanie Klein proposed a "(psychic) position theory" instead of a "(psychic) stage theory".
Henry James Samuel Guntrip was a British psychoanalyst known for his major contributions to object relations theory or school of Freudian thought. He was a Fellow of the British Psychological Society and a psychotherapist and lecturer at the Department of Psychiatry, Leeds University, and also a Congregationalist minister. He was described by Dr Jock Sutherland as "one of the psychoanalytic immortals".
Projective identification is a term introduced by Melanie Klein and then widely adopted in psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Projective identification may be used as a type of defense, a means of communicating, a primitive form of relationship, or a route to psychological change; used for ridding the self of unwanted parts or for controlling the other's body and mind.
Splitting, also called binary thinking, black-and-white thinking, all-or-nothing thinking, or thinking in extremes, is the failure in a person's thinking to bring together the dichotomy of both perceived positive and negative qualities of something into a cohesive, realistic whole. It is a common defense mechanism, wherein the individual tends to think in extremes. This kind of dichotomous interpretation is contrasted by an acknowledgement of certain nuances known as "shades of gray". Splitting can include different contexts, as individuals who use this defense mechanism may "split" representations of their own mind, of their own personality, and of others. Splitting is observed in Cluster B personality disorders such as borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder, as well as schizophrenia and depression. In dissociative identity disorder, the term splitting is used to refer to a split in personality alters.
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Hanna Segal was a British psychoanalyst of Polish descent and a follower of Melanie Klein. She was president of the British Psychoanalytical Society, vice-president of the International Psychoanalytical Association, and was appointed to the Freud Memorial Chair at University College, London (UCL) in 1987. The American psychoanalyst James Grotstein considered that "received wisdom suggests that she is the doyen of "classical" Kleinian thinking and technique." The BBC broadcaster Sue Lawley introduced her as "one of the most distinguished psychological theorists of our time,"
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Paranoid anxiety is a term used in object relations theory, particularly in discussions about the Paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions. The term was frequently used by Melanie Klein, especially to refer to a pre-depressive and persecutory sense of anxiety characterised by the psychological splitting of objects.
Depressive anxiety is a term developed in relation to the depressive position by Melanie Klein, building on Freud's seminal article on object relations of 1917, 'Mourning and Melancholia'. Depressive anxiety revolved around a felt state of inner danger produced by the fear of having harmed good internal objects - as opposed to the persecutory fear of ego annihilation more typical of paranoid anxiety.
Edna O'Shaughnessy was a South African-born British Kleinian psychoanalyst.
Nancy McWilliams, Ph.D., ABPP., is emerita visiting professor at the Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology at Rutgers University. She has written on personality and psychotherapy.
Symbolic equation is the term used in Kleinian psychoanalysis for states of thinking which equate current objects with those of the past, rather than finding a resemblance between the two sets.
References
- ↑ James S. Grotstein, But at the Same Time and on Another Level (London 2009) p. 50
- ↑ John Steiner, "The equilibrium between the paranoid-schizoid and the depressive positions" in Robin Anderson ed., Clinical Lectures on Klein and Bion (London 1992) p. 48
- ↑ Steiner, "The equilibrium" p. 46
- ↑ Steiner, "The equilibrium" p. 53
- ↑ Steiner, "The equilibrium" p. 57
- ↑ John Steiner, Psychic Retreats (1993) p. 14
- ↑ Steiner, Retreats p. 53
- ↑ Grotstein, But p. 50
- ↑ "Susie Steiner obituary". TheGuardian.com . 13 July 2022.
