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“Chethik has done it again! His new second edition is a fitting extension of the first. This gifted child therapist presents the basic concepts of child therapy and elaborates a detailed account of the clinical process with children and parents. Lengthy and rich case presentations include the therapist's reflections, informing the reader about the clinician's feelings, hunches, and countertransference responses. This rare account of the essence of therapy makes this text a 'must' for all practitioners dealing with children, be they student social workers, child fellows, psychology interns, or more advanced practitioners.”

—Judith Mishne, DSW, Ehrenkranz School of Social Work, New York University


“This book will be welcomed by teachers and students of child psychotherapy, both in graduate training programs and in the extension courses offered by many institutes. Chethik describes what goes into careful biopsychosocial assessment of presenting problems, and clarifies the ways in which treatment subsequently draws on that diagnostic frame. Not only does this author offer unusually rich details about beginnings, middles, and endings in play therapy with children, but he also includes the collateral and often less emphasized work with their parents at these different stages.”

—Jean Sanville, PhD, Los Angeles Institute and Society for Psychoanalytic Studies; author of The Playground of Psychoanalytic Therapy


“In an age when child treatment often consists of an expedient pharmacological 'cure,' Morton Chethik's newly revised Techniques of Child Therapy is a breath of fresh air. The merits of Chethik's dynamic approach are many, including the significance he imputes to thorough diagnostic evaluation and his emphasis on the importance of the parental alliance. Also noteworthy are the book's detailed presentations of treatment process and its discussion of more challenging cases involving severe character pathology. Wise and compassionate, this book serves as a model for the practice of dynamic child psychotherapy. It can be recommended unreservedly to novice and more experienced clinicians alike, be they social workers, clinical psychologists, or child psychiatrists.”

—Jerrold R. Brandell, PhD, BCD, author of Of Mice and Metaphors; Founding Editor, Psychoanalytic Social Work

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Table of Contents

I. Introduction to Child Therapy

1. General Characteristics of the Child Patient

2. The Process of Assessment and Its Role in the Treatment Process

3. The Central Role of Play

II. Work with Parents

4. Parent Guidance and Transference Parenting

5. Treatment of the Parent¿Child Relationship

III. The Process of Treatment: The Fundamentals

6. Treatment of the Neurotic Child

7. Treatment of Character Pathology

8. Treatment of the Borderline Child

9. Treatment of the Narcissistically Disturbed Child

10. Focal Psychotherapy

IV. The Process of Treatment: An Elaboration

11. The Case of Andy

12. The Case of Margaret

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About the Author

Morton Chethik, MSW, is an emeritus professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Michigan. He is Director of the Child Psychotherapy Program at the Michigan Psychoanalytic Society and continues his private practice in Ann Arbor, Michigan. A current area of his writing focuses on the special perspective that child therapy provides for understanding work with adult patients.

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Audience

Child psychotherapists and social workers; trainees in a range of mental health disciplines.

Serves as a text in graduate-level courses in clinical psychology, social work, and psychiatry, and in psychoanalytic training programs.

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Course Use

Serves as a text in graduate-level courses in clinical psychology, social work, and psychiatry, and in psychoanalytic training programs.

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Previous editions published by Guilford:

First Edition, © 1989
ISBN: 9780898627459

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New to this edition:

• Chapters providing step-by-step coverage of two major cases, from intake through termination. These presentations offer a window into the therapist's ideas and reactions from moment to moment, bringing clinical techniques fully to life.
• Incorporates advances in knowledge of the central role of play in both child development and child treatment.