The First Relationship: Infant and Mother, with a New Introduction

By Daniel N. Stern

Book Overview

Daniel Stern's pathbreaking video-based research into the intimate complexities of mother-infant interaction has had an enormous impact on psychotherapy and developmental psychology. His minute analyses of the exchanges between mothers and babies have offered empirical support and correction for many theories of development. In the complex and instinctive choreography of "conversations," including smiles, gestures, and gazing, Stern discerned patterns of both emotional harmony and emotional incongruity that illuminate children's relationships with others in the larger world.

Now a noted authority on early development, Stern first reviewed his unique methods and observations in The First Relationship. Intended for parents as well as for therapists and researchers, it offers a lucid and nontechnical overview of the author's key ideas and encapsulates the major themes of his subsequent books.

"When I reread The First Relationship I was astonished to find in it almost all the ideas that have guided my work in the subsequent decades. At first I didn't know whether to be depressed or delighted. As I thought it over, I am encouraged by the realization that I had some basic perspective at the very beginning that was sufficiently well founded to guide twenty-five years of observation and ideas...This book makes it possible to see, or foresee, the unfolding of an intrinsic design."
--from the new introduction by Daniel Stern

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674013883
• ISBN13: 9780674013889
• Release Date: May 2004
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

signifigant research effectsof first infant/parent understan

This is a very important book for the research it presents re. the nature & lifelong effects of parent/infant relationships developed through the first year of bonding. So soory it is out of print as there are few easily readable books on the market that help parents comprehend the data in such a beautiful way. Knowing that their child's entire future is effected by the nature of the relationships established in infancy with each of its parents, can assist parents in supporting optimum development of their child in all areas of the child's development: emotionally, intellectually, socially, physically and spiritually.Please ask author to revise and reprint. Then, of course, notify me. Thanks!