Aggression in Relation to Emotional Development

In this essay, Winnicott states that the basis for a study of actual aggression must be a study of the roots of aggressive intention. The main source of aggression is instinctual experience. In the stage of what Winnicott calls Pre-Concern, aggression is a part of love. If it is lost at this stage of emotional development there is some degree of loss of the capacity to love; to make relationships with objects. During the Stage of Concern there are innocent aggressive impulses towards frustrating objects, and guilt-productive aggressive impulses towards good objects. With the phase he describes as the Growth of Inner World, the child becomes concerned with the effect on his mother of his impulses, and the results of his experiences in his own self. A complex series of defence mechanisms develops, which should be examined in any attempt to understand aggression in a child who has reached this stage. A state of what looks like delusional madness easily appears through the child’s projection of inner world experience out onto his objects. All being well through these stages, aggression then can come to have social value.

Letter to Clare Britton

An extract of a letter from Winnicott to Clare Britton, whom he would marry in 1951, on Winnicott’s own transitional objects in his very early life.

Weaning

In this broadcast and paper for mothers, Winnicott describes weaning as a matter of the mother’s cooperation with the baby, leading naturally to the baby’s cooperation with the mother. The wish to wean comes from the mother, but it is an experience through which the baby can grow, if the mother provides a stable setting. Weaning can also be a time when difficulties start.

Close-up of Mother Feeding Baby

In this broadcast and paper for mothers, Winnicott describes the earliest encounters of the infant with the mother’s breast and how the infant-mother relationship is formed.

Letter to R. S. Hazlehurst

This letter to R. S. Hazlehurst is in response to Hazlehurst’s letter on antisocial behaviour, and describes what can be contributed by psychoanalysis.

Letter to The Times

In this letter to The Times, Winnicott frames a response to reports on delinquency, crime, and insanity and emphasises the importance of considering the ‘other half’ of every antisocial act, that is, society’s revenge feelings. Unpunished misdemeanours or crimes swell the reservoir of unconscious public revenge, and it is important to educate the public that the antisocial child or adult is antisocial because he is ill. The law must follow this by considering how far public (unconscious) feeling needs punishment to be given, regardless of the psychiatric diagnosis.

Notes on the Discussion Held on Dr Winnicott’s Paper ‘The Birth Trauma’

Winnicott responds with ‘answers that might have been’ to the contributions of other analysts to his paper ‘The Birth Trauma’. Reports are also given of the responses of several other analysts.

Letter to Roger Money-Kyrle

Winnicott agrees to contribute to the Festschrift book for Klein’s seventieth birthday. He suggests he might write something on the classification of environmental factors on the basis of individual needs. Winnicott proposes correcting the impression that Klein ignores the environmental factors.

The Infancy of Juliet

This lecture discusses Juliet’s (from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet) childhood. From her relationship to her wet nurse, the reasons for her behaviour in young adulthood are extrapolated. Juliet’s orality is also discussed.

Letter to the British Medical Journal

In this letter to the British Medical Journal, Winnicott welcomes the discussion on the advisability of taking the rectal temperature of children. He argues that it is important to take account both of human and psychological aspects in such an examination and that the psychology demands considerable attention.