Winnicott, Donald Woods (1896–1971)

English psychoanalyst and child psychiatrist. In his early work, Winnicott studied the relationship between mother and child, developing the view that, for the infant, the mother mediates development of the self. His theories were developed in three volumes summarizing his clinical experience, entitled Collected Papers: Through Paediatrics to Psychoanalysis (1958), The Maturational Process and the Facilitating Environment (1965), and Playing and Reality (1971).

Although often regarded as an exponent of object-relations theory, he was a critic of Kleinian approaches to therapy, arguing that only a technique which could allow regression to early childhood might help individuals for whom premature parental demands had impaired the course of ego development.