Using a Technological Augmentation to Enhance Parent-Infant Interactions With Parents at Risk

ABSTRACT

Effective parent training programs may need to be tailored for at-risk parents by using simple language, presenting concrete concepts, and simple technologies. We present four single-case research-design studies examining if the use of digital frames enhances parent-infant interactions with a diverse range of mothers with varied levels of risk for maltreatment. Based on self-modeling, the frames contain photographs of mother-infant dyads in posed interactions representing desired criterion behaviors from the parent-infant interaction (PII) module of SafeCare®. Results indicate that the use of inexpensive digital frames appears to enhance already good outcomes of the SafeCare PII module.     

From Pathological Merger to a Reflective,Triangular Space: Parent-Infant Psychotherapy with a Mother with Borderline Personality Disorder

This article looks at Parent-Infant Psychotherapy work with a mother with Borderline Personality Disorder and her infant son. Mother had suffered a traumatic childhood and, when her son was born, withdrew into a delusion of merger with him, avoiding what she experienced as a violent, threatening and confusing world. Drawing on psychoanalytic and attachment-mentalization theories and neuroscientific and developmental research, this article explores mother’s difficulties in acknowledging her baby as a separate being, and the impact this had on baby, who was slowly turning toward an autistic way of functioning. The article discusses the therapeutic challenges in creating a reflective, triangular space where both mother’s and baby’s experiences could be thought about and understood. Finally, the author considers an interpretative stance that includes both mother’s and baby’s shared and their separate experiences.     

The Development of Reflective Functioning in a Mother Traumatized by Past and Present Events: Facilitating Change in the Parent-Infant Relationship

This article presents clinical work with a woman who experienced trauma in both her childhood and adult life and who demonstrated poor reflective functioning. Treatment began during the patient’s pregnancy and continued with dyadic work with mother and baby in an effort to help the patient address and reflect on past and current life stressors and to develop a healthy mother-child relationship. A review of reflective functioning precedes the case material.     

“Polarity,Paradox and the Organizing Process in Development”; Parent-Infant Psychotherapy and Child Analytic Technique: In Honor of Louis Sander

ABSTRACT

A child analysis and a subsequent family therapy are presented and discussed in terms of Sander’s monumental contributions to infant-parent development and clinical theory. I draw on earlier discussions with Sander on these topics and note how his insights validate a certain kind of child analytic technique I practice.     

Working With Fathers in Psychoanalytic Parent-Infant Psychotherapy edited by Tessa Baradon,Routledge, Abingdon and New York, 2019, 191 pp.

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis -