The Child Study Center's 2007 Lois Bloom Lecture

CHILDHOOD BEHAVIOR PROBLEMS: WHERE DO THEY RESIDE AND WHAT DO THEY REFLECT?

Robert Marvin

Associate Professor
University of Virginia Health System
Department of Psychiatric Medicine
Child and Family Psychiatry

 There are two components of the current framework for thinking about child behavior problems that pervade our culture, including the professions of developmental and child clinical psychology, child psychiatry, pediatrics, education, and family counseling.  These two components are: viewing these behavior problems as residing “in the child;” and viewing these behavior problems as reflecting some sort of negative intent on the part of the child. 

The Bowlby-Ainsworth theory of attachment, and the Circle of Security Intervention, are parts of a shift in the field of early parent-child relationship development suggesting that these two components of our current framework are mistaken and require that as professions and as a society we need to re-examine our view of child behavior problems.  In this presentation, I will outline the sequence of steps in the Circle of Security Intervention, illustrating how the theory and the intervention are consistent in viewing childhood behavior problems as existing within relationships rather than within the child, and as reflecting valid relationship needs on the part of the child rather than negative intent.  Video clips of one parent-child dyad will be used to augment empirical data in illustrating the power of this conceptual shift.