This volume is about the normal development of adulthood, as weIl as its
vieissitudes and the contributions of such development to psycho-
pathology. The authors are psychoanalysts of great dinieal skill and
perceptiveness, but while their focus is consistently a psychodynamie
one, their conceptualizations about adult developmental processes are
applicable to virtually all kinds of therapy. It is extraordinary how
little attention has been paid to the effects of adult developmental
experience on mental development. Obviously mental structures are not
statie after the profound experiences of child- hood and adolescence,
nor are they merely a template upon whieh adult experiences are
processed. The authors dearly demonstrate that current adult experience
always adds to, and interacts with, existing mental structure, whieh is
itself the result of all preceding develop- ment. After a first section
in whieh they examine life cyde ideas on de- velopment from antiquity to
the present, they present their own work as it relates to adult
experience and adult development. Their hypoth- eses about the
psychodynamie theory of adult development are partie- ularly creative
and an enormous contribution to the psychiatrie litera- ture and the
dinical understanding of patients. Consistent with their views that
development in adulthood is an ongoing and dynamic process, they
elaborate their ideas that childhood development is fo- cused primarily
on the formation of psychie structure while adult de- velopment is
concerned with the continued evolution of existing struc- ture and its
use.
