Touchpoints: A Relational Model for Promotion of Infant Mental Health
Presented by T. Berry Brazelton, M.D.
Wednesday, October 24
11:15 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.
Sponsored by the AACAP History and Archives Committee and supported by David Cline, M.D.
Dr. Brazelton’s concept of “Touchpoints” represents opportunities for clinicians to help parents and children through difficult and predictable phases of development. As a child approaches a spurt in development, he often experiences periods of frustration and disintegration or regression. This is likely to be an anxiety-laden time for parents. If parents understand the underlying reason for their infant’s regressive behavior, they can support and comfort their frustrated child, and not just be baffled by him.
Since there is a predictable map in each developmental line, clinicians can join with parents in their struggle to understand by sharing with parents the concept of the next spurt, how powerful it is, how critical it is, and why it leads to a child’s behavior. Each biobehavioral shift or “Touchpoint,” which occurs just before a new spurt in development, becomes a powerful opportunity for understanding and participating in family development. Using the child’s behavior as the language between parents and provider is a powerful way that “Touchpoints” can be integrated into multi-disciplinary settings, designed to provide preventive health care to children and families as well as education and peer support.
The “Touchpoints” approach is based on Dr. Brazelton’s pioneering infant research and more than 50 years of listening to parents and children. A noted international expert on child development, Dr. Brazelton is Clinical Professor Emeritus of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and the Founder of the Child Development Unit at Children’s Hospital, Boston. He is also Founder of the Brazelton Touchpoints Center®, a preventative outreach program that trains professionals nationwide to better serve families of infants and toddlers. He is creator of the Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS), which is used worldwide to test physical and neurological responses of newborns as well as their psychological well-being. Among his 40 books on pediatrics and child development are The Irreducible Needs of Children, Infants and Mothers, which has been translated into 18 languages, Touchpoints the Essential Reference, Touchpoints: Three to Six, and the Brazelton Way series on parenting.
