Abstract

Reading this latest work of Bowlby's gives us a sense of completing an inevitable circle. Here he deals fully with what has always really been his core concern—the nature of the child's tie to his mother. We associate his work, however, mainly with the rupture of that tie. His fruitful work on separation of mother and child, with its only partly intended results in the care of sick and separated children, has materially affected the work of other researchers and practitioners. In the interim between the publication of his famous monograph, “Maternal Care and Mental Health” and this new book, we have had from him and many others increasingly refined analyses of the effects of maternal deprivation on children of various ages and in various situations. In fact the literature was becoming too large and repetitive for the ordinary practitioner.