Developmental Lines - Basic Developmental Line

Basic Developmental Line

Anna Freud initially distinguished six developmental lines. The line considered most 'basic' is one which describes the progression from dependency to emotional self-reliance and adult object relationship. It describes the changes at the level of observable mother-child relationships alongside the evolution of internal representations of objects that create templates for later relationships. Along this developmental line, the following stages are identified:

1. Biological unity between the mother-infant couple. The infant is under the assumption that the mother is a part of itself and is under its control, and the mother experiences the baby as psychologically part of her. Separation from the mother in this stage is thought to give rise to 'separation anxiety proper'. This first stage ends with the first year of life.
2. There is a need-fulfilling anaclitic relationship between the child and its object, which is based on the child's imperative body needs. It has a naturally fluctuating character as the need for the object increases with the arousal of drives, but the importance of the object for the child is reduced when satisfaction has been reached. The extent to which the child's needs are satisfied is thought to determine the images of a good and a bad mother. This stage of the developmental line starts at the second half of the first year of life.
3. The stage of object constancy: the child achieves a consistent representation of the mother, which can be maintained irrespective of the satisfaction of drives: thus, the representation of the mother is more stable. The child becomes able to form reciprocal relationships that can survive disappointments and frustrations.
4. The toddler's positive and negative feelings are focused on the same person and become visible (known as the 'terrible twos'). The child is in conflict: wishing both to be independent and to retain the complete devotion of the mother. In this stage, ambivalence is considered to be normal.
5. The so-called phallic-oedipal phase: this stage is object-centred, characterized by possessiveness of the parent of the opposite sex and jealousy and rivalry with the same sex parent. The child becomes aware that there are aspects of the relationship between the parents from which he is excluded.
6. The latency period: the urgency of the child's drives is reduced and there is a transfer of libido from parents to peers and others in the child's social environment and the community.
7. The preadolescent prelude to the 'adolescent revolt'. A regression from the reasonableness of latency children to a demanding, contrary, inconsiderate attitude characteristic of earlier stages, especially the part-object, need-fulfilling and ambivalent attitudes en behaviour. This strengthens oral, anal and phallic drive components, reviving infantile fantasies and intensifying intra-psychic conflict.
8. Adolescence: representing the ego's struggle to master the upsurge of sexuality and aggression during this period. Two new defence mechanisms (intellectualization and asceticism) emerge in adolescence to defend the individual from the instinctual demands of the body. The adolescent is preoccupied with its internal struggle to transfer emotional investment from parents to new objects.