Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality
First published in 1952, W.R.D. Fairbairn's Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality re-oriented psychoanalysis by centering human development on the infant's innate need for relationships, describing the process of splitting and the internal dynamic relationship between ego and object. His elegant theory is still a vital framework of psychoanalytic theory and practice, infant research, group relations and family therapy.
This classic collection of papers, available for the first time in paperback, has a new introduction by David Scharff and Elinor Fairbairn Birtles which sets Fairbairn's highly original work in context, provides an overview of object relations theory, and traces modern developments, launched by Fairbairn's discoveries.
David E. Scharff, MD is the Director of the Center for the Study of Object Relations, Washington, D.C. and former Director of the Washington School of Psychiatry. He is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences and at Georgetown University Medical School and a Teaching Analyst in the Washington Psychoanalytic Institute.
Ellinor Fairbairn Birtles, the daughter of the late W. R. D. Fairbairn, is Director of SITA Technology Ltd.