6 object relations theory
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Melanie Klein was a psychoanalyst born in Vienna in 1892 who specialized in working with young children and developed Object Relations Theory. She believed that personality is largely a product of early mother-child relationships and emphasized interpersonal relationships, especially within the family. Her theory placed less emphasis on biologically-based drives and more on consistent patterns of relationships. Some key concepts in her theory included phantasies, objects, positions, and the paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions in child development. While her theory highlighted the importance of early development and she directly treated children, a weakness was the lack of controlled studies to validate her theories which were based on clinical experience.
6 object relations theory
- 1. Melanie Klein’s Object Relations Theory Presented by: Mary Anne A. Portuguez, MP, RPm
- 3. BRIEF BIOGRAPHY Melanie Klein was born in Vienna in 1892, the youngest of four children. Klein believed that her birth was unplanned. She had neither a PhD nor an MD degree but became an analyst by being psychoanalyzed. As an analyst, she specialized in working with young children. In 1927, she moved to London where she practiced until her death in 1960.
- 4. IMPORTANT • Emphasizes interpersonal relations, primarily in the family and especially between mother and child. "Object" actually means person (Martin Buber, where are you now that we need you?), and especially the significant person that is the object or target of another's feelings or intentions. • "Relations" refers to interpersonal relations and suggests the residues of past relationships that affect a person in the present. Object relations theorists are interested in inner images of the self and other and how they manifest themselves in interpersonal situations(Daniel, retrieved as of 2016).
- 5. BASIC TENET Object relations theorists see personality as being a product of the early mother-child relationship, and thus they stress determinism over free choice. The powerful influence of early childhood also gives these theories a low rating on uniqueness, a very high rating on social influences, and high ratings on causality and unconscious forces. Klein and other object relations theorists rate average on optimism versus pessimism.
- 6. How it is different from Freud? 1. Object relations theory places less emphasis on biologically based drives and more importance on consistent patterns of interpersonal relationships. 2. More maternal, stressing the intimacy and nurturing of the mother. 3. Object relations theorists generally see human contact and relatedness—not sexual pleasure—as the prime motive of human behavior.
- 7. Some important terms • Phantasies, psychic representations of unconscious id instincts. • Objects • Positions, ways of dealing with both internal and external objects • Paranoid-schizoid position (3rd -4th), a way of organizing experiences that includes both paranoid feelings of being persecuted and a splitting of internal and external objects into the good and the bad. • Depressive position (5th-6th ), the ego is beginning to mature • to the point at which it can tolerate some of its own destructive feelings.
- 8. STRENGTHS • Importance of early development • Direct treatment of children • Formation of play therapy • Use of free association
- 9. WEAKNESSES • Lack of controlled studies • Theories based on personal, clinical experience • Lack of agreement with fellow psychoanalysis
Editor's Notes
- #4: During her childhood Klein observed both parents working at jobs they did not enjoy. Her father was a physician who struggled to make a living in medicine and eventually was relegated to working as a dental assistant. Her mother ran a shop selling plants and reptiles, a difficult, humiliating, and fearful job for someone who abhorred snakes (H. Segal, 1979). Despite her father’s meager income as a doctor, Klein aspired to become a physician. Klein had a special fondness for her older sister Sidonie, who was 4 years older and who taught Melanie arithmetic and reading. Unfortunately, when Melanie was 4 years old, Sidonie died. In later years, Klein confessed that she never got over grieving for Sidonie (H. Segal, 1992). After her sister’s death, Klein became deeply attached to her only brother, Emmanuel, who was nearly 5 years older and who became her close confidant. She idolized her brother, and this infatuation may have contributed to her later difficulties in relating to men. Like Sidonie earlier, Emmanuel tutored Melanie, and his excellent instructions helped her pass the entrance examinations of a reputable preparatory school (Petot, 1990).