Baby Phases 0 to 3, extract from the thesis A Integral Education Theory, by Mónica Felipe
Extracted and translated from:
http://grupomaternal.blogspot.com/2009/06/fases-del-bebe-de-0-3-anos.html
It seems that narcissism is one of the characteristic features of early childhood. As Wilber says, "the process of development of consciousness can be regarded as a progressive decrease of the egocentrism. The young child is basically locked in his own world, oblivious to both the surrounding environment as most human interactions. To the extent that they consolidate the strength and abilities of your consciousness, is simultaneously gaining self-awareness and people around him, and finally to develop qualities that are not born-as care, compassion and integral embrace generous-that allow you to take the place of others. "
According to Margaret Mahler, the biological birth of the human infant and the psychological birth does not coincide in time. "The first is a spectacular event, observable and well circumscribed, and the last is an intra-psychic process of slow development." "We call the psychological birth of the individual separation-individuation process: establishing a sense of separation from a world of reality, and a relationship with him, particularly with regard to the experiences of the 'body' and the main representative of the world as the infant experiences it, the 'primary object of love', the mother.
This process like any intrapsychic process, is expressed throughout the life cycle. It never ends, is always active; into new life stages see how new derivatives act even more primitive processes. But the main achievements of this psychological process occurring in the period from 4th or 5th month after 30 or 36 months, during which we call separation-individuation phase. "
According to Margaret Mahler, the biological birth of the human infant and the psychological birth does not coincide in time. "The first is a spectacular event, observable and well circumscribed, and the last is an intra-psychic process of slow development." "We call the psychological birth of the individual separation-individuation process: establishing a sense of separation from a world of reality, and a relationship with him, particularly with regard to the experiences of the 'body' and the main representative of the world as the infant experiences it, the 'primary object of love', the mother.
This process like any intrapsychic process, is expressed throughout the life cycle. It never ends, is always active; into new life stages see how new derivatives act even more primitive processes. But the main achievements of this psychological process occurring in the period from 4th or 5th month after 30 or 36 months, during which we call separation-individuation phase. "
The phases through which passes a child between 0 and 3 years are as follows:
1. Autistic phase (0-1 months).
"In the first weeks after birth, the infant behaves as a purely biological organism whose instinctive response to stimuli is almost entirely reflected. During this stage we can only speak of a primitive ego apparatus and integrated defense mechanisms purely somatic and overflow and discharge reactions that meet the unique function to retrieve the homeostatic balance. At this stage, there is no discrimination between foreign and domestic. Mahler refers to this stage as a "closed gonadal system" primordial undifferentiated matrix.
2. Symbiotic phase (1-5 months).
As the baby can not ensure their survival, nature has endowed with a psychobiological link between him and his mother, through empathy, acts as a substitute for animal instincts. That is, the mother, by giving the baby what it needs, functions as an auxiliary ego.
"From the second month, the child behaves and acts as if he and his mother were an omnipotent system, a dual unit that shares the same border." Is a "state of undifferentiation, of fusion with the mother, which the "I" has not yet been differentiated from "non-self" and in the interior and exterior are only experienced as something other gradually. " At this stage, the child behaves as if he could not clearly differentiate sensory-physical body of his mother's body and surrounding environment. The baby maintains the illusion that two physically separate individuals compare a common border.
3. Phase separation-individuation (5 months - 2 years).
In this period the baby is able to recognize his mother as a special person to inspect the non-native world and away from the mother. In this period the child develops a dual path that leads to separation, to be aware that it is a separate being of the mother and on the other side to the identification, ie to be considered a distinct and unique. This process is divided into four phases that will be offering an overlapping.
3.1. - Sub-phase differentiation (5 - 9 months).
This stage is characterized by "hatching". It is the 'second' birth experience, the psychological birth, the process by which it begins to be drawn into the world of 'the other thing that is not the mother. It is more permanently alert and responsive to stimuli from their environment, rather than just to their own bodily sensations, or those emanating from within the symbiotic orbit. "
"This is the time when I body-physical-sensory-child wakes up from his previous unit, and dual symbiotic with his mother. It is the time when children try to take the first steps to separate, physically speaking, his passive immersion in childhood. It is the time when your body begins to separate from the body of his mother. The pleasure produced by emerging ego functions and the outside world is expressed in close proximity to the mother. At the same time, seems to occur the differentiation of a primitive body image, but different. "
Keep in mind that this is a separation that is involved sensory-physical body and the mind and feelings are not yet separated from the environment. The child does not yet exist as a distinct emotional self.
In this phase reactions to strangers are particularly pronounced as it has established a close relationship with the mother. The child can express with a strange curiosity, interest, care, anxiety. These reactions are to be calm in the phase of exercise, but it is normal again later.
4. - Sub-phase of exercise (9 - 15 months).
This stage is important because it marks the pinnacle of narcissism in the world, as emphasized by Mahler's own, is the shell of the young child. The child seems intoxicated with his power and greatness of their own world. Narcissism is at the top. The child is enthusiastic about his own abilities, remains absorbed in his discoveries, and is almost in love with the world and his own greatness and omnipotence.
During this period the infant is able to actively move away from the mother and return to it, first by crawling and later mastery of upright locomotion.
At the time of replenishment called emotional or libidinal. During the exercise sub-phase, the child wanders away from the mother, but when you get tired or runs out of energy, seeks to restore contact with her body. This 'refueling' what invigorates and restores his prior interest in exercise and exploration.
5. - Sub-phase of rapprochement (15-24 months).
This is a profoundly important period for future development because it takes place the first fundamental distinction between self and object representations, ie the mother. This means that emerges a separate and distinct emotional I clearly differentiated. This is the psychological birth of the human child.
The child will slowly and gradually realizing their separation and vulnerability. This period is usually followed by a transient episode of rapprochement aimed that the child must gradually and painfully give the illusion of its own omnipotence. Now there is a separate I and, consequently, a separate world. The child has to renounce his shell. Is the expulsion from paradise. Now, even if the child has been separated from the other, which is united in him is his body and his mind to remain attached to the Oedipal stage.
Are common adverse reactions to brief separations, and you can not easily replace the mother, even for adults familiar to the child. This often culminates in a crisis more or less transitory approach, which is of great evolutionary significance. During the rapprochement subphase child sometimes follows every movement of his mother like a shadow (shadowing), can not lose sight of or permit to be away from their immediate vicinity. Sometimes we observe the opposite behavior: the child runs away, and waits for his mother moose and canceling arms, for brief moments, the 'separation'.
"In the first weeks after birth, the infant behaves as a purely biological organism whose instinctive response to stimuli is almost entirely reflected. During this stage we can only speak of a primitive ego apparatus and integrated defense mechanisms purely somatic and overflow and discharge reactions that meet the unique function to retrieve the homeostatic balance. At this stage, there is no discrimination between foreign and domestic. Mahler refers to this stage as a "closed gonadal system" primordial undifferentiated matrix.
2. Symbiotic phase (1-5 months).
As the baby can not ensure their survival, nature has endowed with a psychobiological link between him and his mother, through empathy, acts as a substitute for animal instincts. That is, the mother, by giving the baby what it needs, functions as an auxiliary ego.
"From the second month, the child behaves and acts as if he and his mother were an omnipotent system, a dual unit that shares the same border." Is a "state of undifferentiation, of fusion with the mother, which the "I" has not yet been differentiated from "non-self" and in the interior and exterior are only experienced as something other gradually. " At this stage, the child behaves as if he could not clearly differentiate sensory-physical body of his mother's body and surrounding environment. The baby maintains the illusion that two physically separate individuals compare a common border.
3. Phase separation-individuation (5 months - 2 years).
In this period the baby is able to recognize his mother as a special person to inspect the non-native world and away from the mother. In this period the child develops a dual path that leads to separation, to be aware that it is a separate being of the mother and on the other side to the identification, ie to be considered a distinct and unique. This process is divided into four phases that will be offering an overlapping.
3.1. - Sub-phase differentiation (5 - 9 months).
This stage is characterized by "hatching". It is the 'second' birth experience, the psychological birth, the process by which it begins to be drawn into the world of 'the other thing that is not the mother. It is more permanently alert and responsive to stimuli from their environment, rather than just to their own bodily sensations, or those emanating from within the symbiotic orbit. "
"This is the time when I body-physical-sensory-child wakes up from his previous unit, and dual symbiotic with his mother. It is the time when children try to take the first steps to separate, physically speaking, his passive immersion in childhood. It is the time when your body begins to separate from the body of his mother. The pleasure produced by emerging ego functions and the outside world is expressed in close proximity to the mother. At the same time, seems to occur the differentiation of a primitive body image, but different. "
Keep in mind that this is a separation that is involved sensory-physical body and the mind and feelings are not yet separated from the environment. The child does not yet exist as a distinct emotional self.
In this phase reactions to strangers are particularly pronounced as it has established a close relationship with the mother. The child can express with a strange curiosity, interest, care, anxiety. These reactions are to be calm in the phase of exercise, but it is normal again later.
4. - Sub-phase of exercise (9 - 15 months).
This stage is important because it marks the pinnacle of narcissism in the world, as emphasized by Mahler's own, is the shell of the young child. The child seems intoxicated with his power and greatness of their own world. Narcissism is at the top. The child is enthusiastic about his own abilities, remains absorbed in his discoveries, and is almost in love with the world and his own greatness and omnipotence.
During this period the infant is able to actively move away from the mother and return to it, first by crawling and later mastery of upright locomotion.
At the time of replenishment called emotional or libidinal. During the exercise sub-phase, the child wanders away from the mother, but when you get tired or runs out of energy, seeks to restore contact with her body. This 'refueling' what invigorates and restores his prior interest in exercise and exploration.
5. - Sub-phase of rapprochement (15-24 months).
This is a profoundly important period for future development because it takes place the first fundamental distinction between self and object representations, ie the mother. This means that emerges a separate and distinct emotional I clearly differentiated. This is the psychological birth of the human child.
The child will slowly and gradually realizing their separation and vulnerability. This period is usually followed by a transient episode of rapprochement aimed that the child must gradually and painfully give the illusion of its own omnipotence. Now there is a separate I and, consequently, a separate world. The child has to renounce his shell. Is the expulsion from paradise. Now, even if the child has been separated from the other, which is united in him is his body and his mind to remain attached to the Oedipal stage.
Are common adverse reactions to brief separations, and you can not easily replace the mother, even for adults familiar to the child. This often culminates in a crisis more or less transitory approach, which is of great evolutionary significance. During the rapprochement subphase child sometimes follows every movement of his mother like a shadow (shadowing), can not lose sight of or permit to be away from their immediate vicinity. Sometimes we observe the opposite behavior: the child runs away, and waits for his mother moose and canceling arms, for brief moments, the 'separation'.
6. - Consolidation phase and emotional object constancy (24-36 months).
The last sub-phase of this process is the consolidation of the separation process and the achievement of emotional object constancy-libidinal. The mother is clearly seen as a separate person and located in the outside world, and yet has no existence in the inner world of the child representational.
"Is characterized by:
- A clear and relatively durable differentiation between self and mother.
- The integration of the different partial images of self in a global representation of the self (including aspects "good" and "bad" of the self.
- The integration of the different partial images of objects in a global representation of the object (including aspects "good" and "bad".
"Is characterized by:
- A clear and relatively durable differentiation between self and mother.
- The integration of the different partial images of self in a global representation of the self (including aspects "good" and "bad" of the self.
- The integration of the different partial images of objects in a global representation of the object (including aspects "good" and "bad".
To go to the Normal Stages of Human Development page click (here).