ABSTRACT
The development of psychoanalytic observation in Brazil was greatly stimulated by the foundation of the Mother-Infant Relationship Study Centre in Sao Paulo in 1987 by Dr Marisa Pelella Melega, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, always concerned with the promotion of individual and family mental health. Dr Melega started a study group to test clinical interventions inspired by psychoanalytic observation. Therapeutic Interventions with Parents and Small Children constitute an application of Esther Bick's model of infant observation. This chapter discusses the contribution of the training in infant observation and its developments as Therapeutic Interventions with Parents and Small Children, with regard to children with severe emotional difficulties, mainly within the wide spectrum of autistic disorders. It shows the connection between the observation of behaviours and their meaning as expressions of unconscious content, as a mode of communication, claiming for integration, and representation.
