As soon as a child is born, everyone around him makes predictions about what he might later become. Parents, particularly, worry about what they should and should not do, the effects they’ll have on the child, the mistakes they might make in raising him. Professionals, also, carefully research the various factors which can influence a child’s destiny. Instead of idle discussions on psychological determinism, the role of precocious traumas and other more or less theoretical precautions, the author has put together a series of first-hand accounts of the children he has worked with: children whose development he has followed for many years, from birth to adolescence, and sometimes beyond.
Bertrand Cramer is a professor of pediatric psychiatry at the University of Geneva, and head of the Child Psychiatry Clinic of Geneva.