Developmental Science and Psychoanalysis

As a discipline, psychoanalysis began at the interface of mind and brain and has always been about those most basic questions of biology and psychology: loving, hating, what brings us together as lovers, parents, and friends and what pulls us apart in conflict and hatred. These are the enduring mysteries of life and especially of early development-how young children learn the language of the social world with its intertwined biological, genetic, and experiential roots and how infants translate thousands of intimate moments with their parents into a genuine, intuitive, emotional connection to other persons. Basic developmental neuroscience and psychology has also of late turned to these basic questions of affiliation: of how it is that as humans our most basic concerns are about finding, establishing, preserving, and mourning our relationships. These areas in broad strokes are the substance of mind and brain, and the last decade has brought much new science to the biology of attachment, love, and aggression. Series Foreword -- Introduction -- Embodied psychoanalysis? Or, on the confluence of psychodynamic theory and developmental science -- Commentary -- The social construction of the subjective self: the role of affect-mirroring, markedness, and ostensive communication in self-development -- Commentary -- Primary parental preoccupation: revisited -- Commentary -- Exploring the neurobiology of attachment -- Commentary -- The Interpretation of Dreams and the neurosciences -- Commentary -- In the best interests of the late-placed child: a report from the Attachment Representations and Adoption Outcome study -- Commentary -- Child psychotherapy research: issues and opportunities -- Commentary -- Effectiveness of psychotherapy in the “real world”: the case of youth depression -- Commentary -- Controlling the random, or who controls whom in the randomized controlled trial? -- Commentary -- Psychoanalytic responses to violent trauma: the Child Development–Community Policing partnership -- Commentary -- Multi-contextual multiple family therapy -- Commentary -- Towards a typology of late adolescent suicide -- Commentary