The Only-Child Archetype: A Folktale

Abstract

In Part III, the therapeutic implications of only-child research is discussed. As a practicing psychotherapist, I am primarily motivated to do research that benefits other clinicians and people involved in the field of social science. Perhaps one of the most personally satisfying aspects of the research is that it has also been beneficial to many only-children who have had their experience witnessed. However, my work will, I hope, benefit a variety of professionals working with not only young only-children but adults as well. This chapter sets out to describe the idea of an only-child archetype to provide a way of understanding the complexity of only-child experience. The rest of Part III discusses the implications of a matrix of only-child experience and the themes which it encapsulates.