1. The child, as we said earlier, develops a sense of "mother-constancy". This is crucial. If the child cannot predict the behaviour (let alone the presence) of his mother from one moment to another - it would find it hard to believe in anything, predict anything and expect anything. Because the self, to some extent (some say: to a large extent), is comprised of the adopted and internalised outcomes of the interactions with others - negative outcomes get to be incorporated in the budding self as well as positive ones. In other words, a child feels loveable and desirable if it is indeed loved and wanted. If it is rejected, it is bound to feel worthless and worthy only of rejection. In due time, the child develops behaviours which yield rejection by others and the outcomes of which thus conform with his self-perception. 2. The adoption and assimilation of the judgement of others and its incorporation into a coherent sense of self-worth and self-esteem. 3. The discounting or filtering-out of contrarian information. Once Bowlby's "working models" are at work, they act as selective membranes. No amount of external information to the contrary alters these models significantly. Granted, shifts in RELATIVE positions may and do occur in later stages of life. A person can feel more or less accepted, more or less competent, more or less integrated into a given social setting. But these are changes in the values of parameters WITHIN a set equation (=the working model). The equation itself is rarely altered and only by very serious life crises. Reprinted with permission from: "For Want of a Better Good" (In process) Author: Alan Challoner MA (Phil) MChS (Attachment Theory Researcher Counsellor in Adoption & Fostering, and associated child development issues. MA awarded by thesis on the psychology of handicap - A Culture of Ambiguity; 1992): "A developmental line for narcissism has been devised by Temeles, and it consists of twelve phases that are characterised by a particular relationship between self-love and object-love and occur in a precise order." (Temeles, M.S. - A developmental line for narcissism: The path to self-love and object love. In Cohen, Theodore, B.; Etezady, M. Hossein; & Pacella, B.L. (Eds.) The Vulnerable Child. Volume 1; The Vulnerable Child. International Univ. Press; Madison, CT, USA - 1993.) PROTO-SELF AND PROTO-OBJECT As the infant is incapable of distinguishing either the self or the object as adults do, this phase is marked by their absence. However he is competent in certain attributes particularly those that allow him to interact with his environment. From birth his moments of pleasure, often the instrument of infant-mother interaction, are high points in the phase. He will try to avoid the low points of un-pleasure by creating a bond that is marked by early maternal intervention to restore the status quo. BEGINNING SELF-OBJECT DIFFERENTIATION AND OBJECT PREFERENCE