Research Spotlight: “Shame, Narcissism & Ego – Oh My!”

Today’s paper is…

Schore, A. N. (1991). Early superego development: The emergence of shame and narcissistic affect regulation in the practicing period. Psychoanalysis & Contemporary Thought, 14(2), 187-250.

Dr Allan Schore is a researcher and psychoanalyst at UCLA. In this classic theory paper he summarises a psychodynamic model for why and how we initially develop shame – and our responses to it – as young children.

Schore believes shame development begins in the early separation-individuation phase (12-18 months), i.e., when we first begin to develop an awareness of our identity as separate from our primary caregiver.

So, what happens here?

• When a child reunites with their primary care giver after an absence, their emerging self identity is in a “hyper stimulated, grandiose, narcissistically charged state of heightened arousal” (i.e., they’re self-focused and freaking out).
• This is because separations from the primary caregiver (and the subsequent reunions) are so new and strange, the vulnerable emerging self is not sure how to deal with them. They are a huge source of stress. (Shame, says Schore, is more intimately tied to physiological stress than any other emotion).
• The child anticipates the caregiver will share their experience of stress (i.e., “mum will be just as freaked out by our separation and reunion as I am.”) but of course, it’s not new to the caregiver who, as an adult, has already individuated and has learned through experience that separations and reunions are tolerable.
• So, child and caregiver experience a moment of misattunement (something we EFT therapists really understand): the child is stressed and the caregiver doesn’t match their affect. Ugh. That’s highly unpleasant and unsettling.

How will the child’s nervous system respond?

• Schore says the child gets a shock from the misattunement, which causes their narcissistic affect (i.e., self-focus) to deflate.
• So the child suddenly switches from being driven by their sympathetic nervous system (i.e., high arousal, fight or flight) to being driven by the parasympathetic nervous system (i.e., low arousal, rest and digest).
  What does this look like on the outside?
• Schore says the child is ‘propelled’ into hypo-arousal (i.e., nervous system shut down: numbing, silence, curling up, possibly sensory dissociation). The word ‘propelled’ gives us a clue that this is a state over which this child has little control. At this age, children have very little capacity to understand or regulate hypo-arousal: it just happens, and they’re along for the ride.

What happens next?

Schore says the caregiver’s response to the sudden shut-down is really crucial here:

• If the caregiver is responsive, accepting and stays close, the child learns they and their emotions are valuable, don’t need to be disowned or shut down. The misattunement was just a moment – it doesn’t reflect the state of their relationship or define their value to the caregiver, and it is reparable. This in turn frees greater capacity for self-regulation: ‘If my caregiver can be here for me in this difficult moment, maybe I can stay present with it too?’
• If the caregiver is unresponsive or non-accepting or moves away, the child learns something about their fragile, emerging self is unacceptable, not valuable, should be disowned and shut down. The emerging sense of self-disgust (another way to define shame) is reinforced.
• Schore notes these ‘reunion microinteractions’ (lasting 30 sec – 3 min) are therefore critical for developing a sense of self, as well as a framework for self-regulation and tolerance of new emotional experiences, including shame.
• Repeated experiences like this shape how the child sees themself and their ability to manage their emotions (I often say to my clients: “Parents are our first mirrors – we look at them and their responses tell us who we are.”)

To summarise another way:

• The micro-misattunement with the caregiver brings up new and aversive feelings.
• If the caregiver is responsive and accepting, I – as the child – learn: ‘This interaction was strange, but I am ok.’ and the aversion can be externalised: ‘Something strange happened here – I can possibly learn from it, but our relationship is fine. We’re ok, so I’m ok.’ (We might think of this as ‘adaptive shame’ or ‘guilt’ – shame about something I’ve done – and can change – not about who I am.)
• If the caregiver is unresponsive and/or non-accepting, I learn: ‘This interaction was strange and I am not ok.’ The aversion is internalised and becomes shame/self-disgust: ‘Something strange happened here and I lost connection with my caregiver as a result. Our relationship is damaged. We’re not ok, which must mean I’m not ok.’ (This is more like ‘maladaptive shame’ – shame about who I am, about something I cannot readily change.)

What does this research mean for us, as EFT Therapists?

For me, this model reflects patterns I often see in my adult clients, in their adult relationships.

• It is a rich, attachment focused and ultimately compassionate model to keep in mind when taking clients’ attachment histories, and when understanding the disconnection they seem to create in their adult relationships, which may be fuelled by shame.
• It reinforces the importance of responsiveness and acceptance in parent-child bonds as the foundation for developing self-identity, self-regulation and the courage and confidence to then relate to others over time.
• It validates Sue Johnson’s eloquent statement that whenever two people are in disconnection or disagreement they are really asking the same question: ‘ARE you there for me:
  o Are you ACCESIBLE: can I reach you?
  o Are you RESPONSIVE: will you respond to me?
  o Are you EMOTIONALLY ENGAGED: do I matter to you?’
• I can hear the child in Schore’s model asking these same questions at that moment of misattunement, and it moves me to want to help my clients find and know that ‘A.R.E.-experience’ within themselves and with the people they love.