Download Author: Sarnoff, Charles M.D.

57 eBooks available.

The Aggressive Drive and Its Viscissitudes

The ego organization of the latency-age child is different from the ego organization of the adolescent and adult, so much so, in fact, that the symptoms and behavior that are a product of its function can be depended upon, to a large extent, to disappear with the transition to adolescent and adult ego forms. Also covered in this chapter are the shaping of certain problem areas; emotional imprinting leading to later psychopathology; the development of the superego; and the genesis of masochism. Because the operative organs for the discharge of aggression are much more developed during latency than are those for the sexual drive, teasing and rough fantasy play provide a good venue in the search for the antecedents and underpinnings of adolescent masochism.

Shifting Symbolic Forms During Late Latency-Early Adolescence

One of the tasks of the child therapist is to hasten as well as shepherd and encourage this natural process of development. The therapist who can detect the child’s bewilderment and clarify the sources of confusion helps to put the communicatively oriented developmental processes back on the track.

The Sexual Drive and Its Viscissitudes

The sexual drive undergoes a remarkable degree of maturation and development from birth to about 15 years of age. In the first years of life, drive energies are involved in a search for pleasurable discharge, concentered all in self. In early childhood and latency, drives find outlet through channels dominated by fantasy. At puberty, an organ system specific for the drive matures, providing an outlet channel to conduct libidinal energies toward love objects, which are beyond the limits of the self. Finally, in late adolescence, there is a chance to establish an articulation of the drive and organ system with the needs of the object.

Simple (Generic) Symbols

The existence of simple symbols implies the presence of conscious and readily available meanings shared by a thought with the signs or words, which have come to represent it.

Psychotherapeutic Strategies in the Latency Years

Dr. Sarnoff is the most prominent authority on latency. In this volume, he extends his work beyond the characteristics of ego function during the ages 6-12, to include the entire age period of latency in a study of the role of cognitive development and the unconscious in latency-age adjustment and psychopathology. In addition, well-springs of adolescent and adult adjustment and pathology in the latency years are described.

To achieve these goals in the present volume, chapters are developed that present detailed studies of pathological entities both from the descriptive and developmental standpoints. Special attention is paid to the problems of assessment that are important in understanding latency-age children. The work culminates in a series of chapters that deal with the theory of psychotherapy in relation to fantasy, cognitive maturation and the formulation of interpretations, the nature of the symbolizing function as the child grows toward adolescence, and the changing nature of fantasies and sensitivities as the child matures within latency. The chapters on psychotherapeutic strategies deal in detail with clinical case material, illustrating how to treat the silent child, how to convert the noncommunicative play child in to one who plays out and works out his problems through play, how to furnish the playroom, how to handle parents, and how to deal with the child who destroys the playroom.

This is an impressive clinical work—one that places therapeutic work with latency-age children at the forefront of clinical thought and therapy, where it belongs.

Reviews

“This work is without question the new standard for describing the process and structure of latency as well as the treatment of latency-age disorders. The excellence of this book make commentary difficult. Sarnoff has used the past decade since the publication of Latency to further refine his critical analysis and synthesis of the latency period. This has resulted in more extensive examples of treatment situations, accompanying psychodynamic formulations, and suggested solutions. Sarnoff’s crisp writing style makes for an exciting and comprehensive text for both beginning and experienced child psychotherapists, Simply stated, no better work can be had for understanding this crucial developmental period.”

George Kowallis, M.D.
Director of Child Psychiatry Training
St. Vincent’s Hospital, New York

Psychoanalytic Symbols

The Psychoanalytic Symbol was best described by Ernest Jones (1916). He noted that a Psychoanalytic symbol is formed when there has been repression of the abstract connection between a representation (manifest symbolic form) and that, which is represented (latent symbol).

The Developmental Period

The process of ongoing development during the latency years may be defined in terms of normal and pathological aspects of both functional and maturational elements.

Poetic Symbols

Poetic symbols are verbal, visual or musical expressions that fit latent concepts and abstractions to representations that evoke awareness and clarify meaning.

Ego Structure

Clinical data support the position that the latency state is a socially guided configuration of ego structures, and the related view that drive strengths are sustained during the latency period.

Transcendent Symbols

Transcendent symbols are cryptic representations, which are interpreted by devout believers to be manifestations of the transcendent immanence of deity in all things. The words and powers of gods are thought to be conveyed to man by the manifest forms of transcendent symbols