ABSTRACT
P. and A. Ornstein’s conceptualization of parenting is based on Kohut’s self psychology which recognizes the central importance of empathy as an emotional nutrient and its failures in parenting to be of major pathogenic significance. Parental empathy requires not only a temporary inversion into the inner world of a child, but a sustained capacity to perceive the child’s affects and his particular manner of protecting himself from the potentially destructive (i.e., overstimulating) impact of his environment. The capacity for adult empathy is the hallmark of successful transformation of infantile narcissism into its adult form. The capacity for empathy is a reliable indicator of the completion of adult self-development. The placing of the capacity for empathy into the center of parental functions parenting is linked inextricably to self-development.
