Abstract:
Psychoanalytic ideas of development and adaptation are presented. The perspective of early
child-parent relations as structuring blocks of personality is applied to reveal the role of early
interactive experience on adaptive/maladaptive functioning. Data from the assessment of 134 children
140
(age 6–15) made with apperception technique RATC are obtained. The Bulgarian version of two
multidimensional instruments measuring defense mechanisms DSQ (Bond et. al., 1993) and coping
strategies COPE (Carver et. al., 1989) of the parents are used. Questionnaires were administrated to
46 fathers and 71 mothers. Results show reliability close to the original versions, and correlations of
the scales prove hypotheses of constructs and their interdependence.
Data obtained by correlation and regression analyses support the idea of the indirect influence
of parents’ adaptive functioning on their children. Two models, based on the representations of either
objects and/or relations and the process of identification are suggested to reveal different paths of
influence. First explaining similarities in adaptive strategies through identification of the child with
the idealized aspect of the parents; second is applying the idea of development of complementary role
position in highly affectively charged situations as an emotional regulation mechanism in children.
