Motherhood constellation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Motherhood Constellation is a mental organization in which the child is most prominent.
Psychoanalyst Daniel N. Stern has spent much of his research on what it means to become a mother and how this influences the development of the child. Stern proposes that new mothers create a ‘motherhood constellation’.[citation needed] This constellation, which – depending on culture, personality and the like - can continue for months to years, implies that the mother is preoccupied with the well-being and protection of her child. The constellation may become less pre-eminent, but will never disappear: when the child is in danger, it will be reactivated immediately.[citation needed]
To be able to face the stressor of protecting her child, the mother needs a holding environment: an environment that will provide a psychologically framing in which she feels validated, encouraged and supported. Using this context, the mother is able to explore and develop her maternal behavior.
A new mother will – even during the pregnancy - start forming a ‘maternal matrix’; a network that consists of several experienced mothers or parents, to strengthen the holding environment.[1]
In his work Stern also refers to ‘attunement’ of the caregiver: the responsiveness of parents to the communication of the child’s needs. Mothers who engage in less attuned interactions with their child lack behaviors that encourage optimal levels of interaction. However, highly attuned mothers may not always rank high on “similarity of response” because they do not focus on the physical behavior of the infants to such an extent as is necessary for infant social awareness. Instead, adults tune into the infant’s inner state without imitating the overt behavioral manifestations of the state.[2]
