Childhood Psychosis

In this essay, Winnicott emphasises that, in the study of a psychotic child, paediatrics and psychology tend to part company and that it is only by comparing the emotional development of the psychotic and the healthy child that progress can be made. The psychotic child needs a specialized environment more or less continuously over a period of time, so the study of the child should be undertaken at home, provided it is a good home, capable of making an active adaptation to the particular child’s needs. There is little to be said for the treatment of a psychotic child in a hospital ward.

Criança psicótica brinca?: considerações acerca do brincar na psicose

This paper discusses the playing as a symbolic activity, which is defined as the representation of what is absent. Therefore, to take place, it depends on the separation process. It discusses the playing of psychotic children, for whom the subjective position was structured without the absence inscription. Through the study of two short clinical cases, it examines whether the ludic activity of a psychotic child is, indeed, a playing activity.