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Using Modern Attachment Theory to Guide Clinical Assessments of Early Attachment Relationships

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Attachment-Based Clinical Work with Children and Adolescents

Part of the book series: Essential Clinical Social Work Series ((ECSWS))

Abstract

In this chapter, we offer a review of recent research on mother–infant right brain-to-right brain visual, auditory, and tactile attachment communications and on current developmental neuroscientific studies of the interpersonal neurobiological mechanisms that facilitate or inhibit the experience-dependent maturation of the infant’s developing right brain. With this data in mind, we then utilize regulation theory to model the implicit right brain/mind/body neurodynamics of a relational sequence between a 7-month-old infant and his mother. Lastly, we offer some thoughts about the unique contributions of modern attachment theory’s integration of biological and psychoanalytic domains in constructing more effective models of early assessment, intervention, and prevention. We argue that the interdisciplinary trans-theoretical lens of regulation theory can be applied to any clinician’s understanding of how one’s subjectivity and implicit corporeal self is used in both assessment and treatment of deficits in affective intersubjective processes at all stages of the life span, including the critical periods of infancy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Allan N. Schore

  2. Newton Center for Affect Regulation, La Jolla, USA

    Ruth P. Newton

  3. Newton Center for Affect Regulation, St. Vincent de Paul Village, San Diego, CA, USA

    Ruth P. Newton

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  1. Allan N. Schore
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Correspondence to Allan N. Schore .

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  1. College of Social Work, University of Utah, 395 South 1500 East, Salt Lake City, 84112, Utah, USA

    Joanna Ellen Bettmann

  2. New York University, New York, 10014, New York, USA

    Donna Demetri Friedman

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Schore, A., Newton, R. (2013). Using Modern Attachment Theory to Guide Clinical Assessments of Early Attachment Relationships. In: Bettmann, J., Demetri Friedman, D. (eds) Attachment-Based Clinical Work with Children and Adolescents. Essential Clinical Social Work Series. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-4848-8_4

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