This ambitious volume brings together some of the most outspoken theorists, researchers and practitioners building the field of infant mental health from overlapping frameworks, models and disciplines. It reveals the challenges and excitement of this time, as this field sorts through the psychoanalytic and attachment theories of its origins, integrates emerging neuroscience and epigenetic theories whose applications to practice are still being worked out, to stake out its territory, tests its boundaries, and develops its own identity. More than that, this collection suggests a truly transdisciplinary path for a whole new kind of field, born from a range of others, that is creating new meanings and possibilities at their intersections for babies, families, clinicians, systems of care, researchers and policy-makers.—Joshua Sparrow, M.D., Harvard Medical School, Boston Children's Hospital

Recent advances in neuroscience now describe how early relational experiences directly impact the developing brain, and thereby all later social emotional functioning. These data are forging tight links between optimal early brain maturation, the emergence of the infant's adaptive coping capacities, and infant mental health. In this book an impressive group of experts highlight the critical role of the development of mental health in infancy and early childhood. I highly recommend this volume to clinicians and researchers alike.—Allan N. Schore, Ph.D., UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, author of The Science of the Art of Psychotherapy

For those of us who work daily with parents who never smile at their baby and have no idea how to play, this book explains the reasons for their parenting deficits, the effects of those deficits on the baby, and the interventions that we need to implement to help them become good enough parents. The giants in the field of infant mental health have created this comprehensive volume that so vividly brings the research to life in a way that practitioners can understand and appreciate. I know I will make better decisions for the families in my courtroom as a result of reading this book.—Cindy S. Lederman, J.D., Circuit Court Judge, Eleventh Judicial Circuit Juvenile Justice Center

This book addresses the complex realities of family life and the real work of clinicians in their multifaceted efforts to support families with infants and young children. The essential ingredients for optimal mental health in the first 5 years are insightfully explained with practical approaches to treatment when development is derailed. The authors integrate psychodynamic theory and treatment with developmental theory and research, making well-informed treatment of infant-parent relationships accessible to all clinicians.—Barbara Kalmanson, Ph.D., ICDL Graduate School, KidsAttuned.org

Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health: Core Concepts and Clinical Practice presents a broad perspective using concepts and approaches based on psychoanalytic and psychodynamic theory, observations, neuroscience and, perhaps, most importantly clinical sensitivity. A goal of the book is to help the reader understand the different meanings of the important statement made many years ago by T. Berry Brazelton that 'the quality of the infant-parent or child-parent relationship is the best predictor of outcome for any child.' This sensitive book provides an interdisciplinary understanding that is fundamental to training and practice with infants, young children and their families. The authors do an excellent job in elaborating on different theoretical and conceptual models as well as therapeutic approaches to support clinicians in exploring the gateways and pathways for therapeutic work with infants, young children, and families. Examples of events and dilemmas dealt with every day by families and clinicians are interwoven throughout the presentation of theory and practice in a creative and interesting way. This book will be important to help professionals gaining knowledge in the field of infant and early childhood mental health understand major historical developments and different perspectives that are needed to gain clinical understanding and implement effective practice addressing issues of prevention, intervention and treatment.—Joy D. Osofsky, Ph.D., Barbara Lemann Professor, Departments of Pediatrics and Psychiatry, LSU Health Sciences Center

There has been an urgent need for a practically oriented book that integrates the modern understanding of mind with a hands-on guide to early childhood interventions. This is the book to bring about this integration. It is simply the best book that provides a pragmatic approach to support frontline clinicians at the same time as conveying the complexity of ideas that must guide such interventions. It is a beautifully written, comprehensive, user-friendly guide that will run into many reprints and editions.—Peter Fonagy, Ph.D., FBA, Freud Memorial Professor of Psychoanalysis and Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London; Chief Executive, The Anna Freud Centre

This remarkable book should be mandatory reading for professionals working with young children and their families everywhere. Combining as it does material from a wide range of professional disciplines, this book by Kristie Brandt and her colleagues breaks new ground by seamlessly integrating clinical and theoretical perspectives in a way that is theoretically rich and at the same time rooted in everyday clinical experiences. While this book is both provocative and original it is also eminently accessible and thus succeeds in offering an indispensable roadmap to all who seek to understand the narrative of early relationships. A major accomplishment!—J. Kevin Nugent, Ph.D., Director of the Brazelton Institute, Department of Developmental Medicine, Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School

Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health: Core Concepts in Clinical Practice represents a unique opportunity for the practicing clinician in the field of infant mental health. Rarely does the work of so many leading researchers and clinicians come together in the one comprehensive volume. The contents of this book are both profoundly deep, and broad: deep in that each chapter represents the culmination of years of clinical work and research from pioneering clinicians in the field of infant mental health, and broad in that the expansive scope of the book covers most of the critical clinical and social phenomena facing infants and parents which we as professionals within society are trying to grapple. Each of the authors shares their comprehensive understanding of the developmental, social, relationship and emotional needs of infants and their families, and gives us real advice on how to creatively intervene in our day-to-day work.

The book is supremely practical in that it provides support to develop hands-on skills desperately needed by clinicians who are directly engaged with families. The book is superbly well written, clear and is a joy to read. The quality and comprehensiveness of the writing invites us to return time and again to glean more of the clinical wisdom of the authors.—Assoc Prof Campbell Paul, Consultant Infant Psychiatrist, Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne and the Royal Women's Hospital; Honorary Principal Fellow, Department of Psychiatry, Univ of Melbourne