ABSTRACT
This chapter is concerned with the theories about development that operate in the therapist's mind and that therefore influence the creation of the reconstructed "clinical infant." These theories are examined in the light of new knowledge about the "observed infant" and the development of the different domains of sense of self. It is important to recall that an assessment of clinical theory from the perspective of direct infant observation says nothing about the validity of clinical theories as therapeutic constructs. Knowledge of the observed infant seems to have the greatest potential impact on a number of theoretical issues at the level of metapsychology. They are addressed by issue, in loose chronological order rather than by school of thought. It is a traditional psychoanalytic notion that during the first months of life, the infant is protected from external stimuli by a stimulus barrier, a "protective shield against stimuli".
