Object Relations School

Object Relations School

the group of psychoanalysts, including Karl Abraham, Melanie KLEIN and Donald WINNICOTT, who developed FREUD's acknowledgement that the individual needs ‘others’ (people and things) with whom to interact to achieve fulfilment of instinctual needs. The significance of the object (which includes other people) is in the emotional meaning it, or its mental representation, has for the person. The emphasis of the Object Relations School in Europe can be contrasted with EGO PSYCHOLOGY in the USA, as displaying more ambivalence, and as having more depth, in its discussions of PERSONALITY and SOCIALIZATION.