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Previewing: a preventive strategy that promotes adaptive development
1Child and Adolescent Outpatient Department, Cornell University Medical Center, White Plains, NY 10605.
American Journal of Psychotherapy
|April 1, 1991
Summary
Mothers use "previewing" to prepare infants for developmental changes, enhancing relational patterns. This process offers therapists insights for diagnosing and treating psychopathology by integrating subjective and objective maternal behaviors.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Maternal-Infant Interaction
- Behavioral Science
Background:
- Mother-infant interaction reveals unique processes in relational pattern evolution.
- Previewing involves mothers anticipating infant development and guiding infants through new skills and their relational impact.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore the phenomenon of previewing in mother-infant interactions.
- To understand previewing's role in the etiology of human behavior.
- To assess previewing's potential as a diagnostic and therapeutic tool in psychotherapy.
Main Methods:
- Observational analysis of mother-infant interactions.
- Integration of maternal subjective perceptions with objective behaviors.
- Assessment of infant's objective developmental changes.
Main Results:
- Previewing integrates maternal subjective perceptions with objective behaviors.
- Therapists can diagnose psychopathology by comparing maternal perceptions, behaviors, and infant development.
- Previewing facilitates access to unrehearsed maternal material regarding relational impact of infant development.
Conclusions:
- Previewing offers a novel approach to understanding and intervening in psychopathology.
- Therapeutic use of previewing enhances maternal and infant predictive capacities.
- This process fosters mastery over interpersonal challenges associated with developmental change.