Emotional, withdrawn, thoughtless, volatile, even violent : there always comes a time when parents think that their child has become impossible. It is quite common that, not knowing what more they can do, parents are tempted to simply give up. This book is for them. Through five cases of difficult children, Stanley Greenspan shows that these children can change, becoming more pleasant and responsive. He explains how to help them by emphasising the sensory and motional differences of each of child, giving practical advice in support of his theories. Importantly this book allows parents to identify for themselves the personality of their child, in order to find in the child’s weaknesses the ingredients for future success.

A doctor of medicine, and teacher of psychiatry, behavioural psychology et paediatrics at the George Washington Faculty of Medicine in the United States, Stanley Greenspan is, according to T. Berry Brazelton, “one of the most remarkable child specialists of our time”.

Jacqueline Salmon is a journalist at the Washington Post.