ABSTRACT
How fear of physical injury develops throughout childhood and adolescence, in both boys and girls, has been reviewed by Jerome Blackman. He tells us: “When we speak of fear of physical injury, we are dealing both with reality and fantasy. Sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between the two” (Blackman, 2014, p. 123). He reminds us that some causes of fear of physical injury are identical in girls and boys. When children begin walking they become aware that when they fall, they get hurt. They also become aware that they can be physically hurt by someone else, such as a sibling who pushes them down. Blackman adds that while going through the separation–individuation phase (Mahler, 1968; Mahler, Pine & Bergman, 1975) children, both girls and boys, also share a similar fear of physical injury. When they experience aggression in the service of psychic separation from their mothers and other mothering persons they develop the capacity to fear that other persons who are targets for their aggressive feelings, in turn, can harm them. Blackman then illustrates how fear of physical injury in girls and boys is also dissimilar when the fear is linked to fantasies involving sexual organs. When little girls finger their vaginas, realise an “inner canal” and learn that babies come through this canal, they develop the fear that they can be hurt. Of course each 34girl’s handling of this fear and the fantasy associated with it will be different owing to many factors. As Blackman states, many girls deny such “vulnerability”. Boys begin to finger their genitals for pleasure just before the age of two. Blackman states: “By age three, their competitive feelings toward either parent will likely be projected, so that either parent is feared, even if the parents are gentle. For boys, the witnessing of the female genitalia (mother undressing, or girls being diapered during play groups) creates a thought of being without their pendulous penis. This thought adds to what is dramatically referred to as ‘castration anxiety’” (Blackman, 2014, pp. 123–124).
