29 Facts About Melanie Klein

Melanie Klein was the primary figure in the development of object relations theory.

Melanie Klein suggested that pre-verbal existential anxiety in infancy catalyzed the formation of the unconscious, which resulted in the unconscious splitting of the world into good and bad idealizations.

Melanie Klein was born into a Jewish family and spent most of her early life in Vienna.

Melanie Klein was the fourth and final child of parents Moriz, a doctor, and Libussa Reizes.

Melanie Klein then had her second child, Hans, in 1907 and her third and final child, Erich, in 1914.

Shortly after her family moved to Budapest in 1910, Melanie Klein began a course of therapy with psychoanalyst Sandor Ferenczi.

So, Melanie Klein took advantage of this by developing her "play technique".

Around the same time Melanie Klein presented her ideas, Anna Freud was doing the very same.

Melanie Klein was one of the first to use traditional psychoanalysis with young children.

Melanie Klein was innovative in both her techniques and her theories on infant development.

Melanie Klein came to this conclusion by using actual observations of herself and mothers that she knew.

Melanie Klein described how infants show interest in their mothers' face, the touch of their mothers' hands, and the infants' pleasure in touching their mothers' breast.

Melanie Klein says that as early as two months, infants show interest in the mother that goes beyond feeding.

Melanie Klein observed that the infant will often smile up at the mother and cuddle against her chest.

Melanie Klein goes on to say that infants recognize that their achievements, such as crawling and walking, give their parents joy.

In one observation, Melanie Klein says that the infant wishes to evoke love and pleasure in their mother with their achievements.

Melanie Klein says that the infant notices that their smile makes their mother happy and results in the mothers attention.

Melanie Klein says that it is easy to mistake a baby that enjoys their food and cries a little for a happy baby.

Melanie Klein saw children's play as their primary mode of emotional communication.

Melanie Klein then attempted to interpret the unconscious meaning behind their play.

Melanie Klein named the state of the mind in which the sustaining principle of life dominates the depressive position.

Melanie Klein employs phantasies representing love and restoration to restore the others he destroyed.

Melanie Klein named it the depressive position because the efforts to restore the integrity of the damaged object are accompanied by depression and despair.

Melanie Klein later developed her ideas about an earlier developmental psychological state corresponding to the disintegrating tendency of life, which she called the paranoid-schizoid position.

Melanie Klein coined the term "paranoid-schizoid defense" to emphasize how the child's worries manifest as persecution fantasies and how he defends himself against persecution by separating.

Melanie Klein is known to be one of the primary founders of object relations theory.

Melanie Klein thought it was expulsion while Freud speculated it was repression.

Melanie Klein argues that the most important emotional force against envy is gratitude.

Melanie Klein argues that if men shared childcare equally with women, they would be equally involved in the phantasies associated with infancy's paranoid and depressive worries.