This book is about the latency phase, also in the light of the overstimulation that children are exposed to in today's complex and digitised society.

This volume deals with the primary school age or, in psychoanalytic terms, the latency phase. It brings together contributions from various authors: psychoanalysts, pedagogues, child neuropsychiatrists; it also contains a historical essay. Observing children in this phase of development with a careful eye is also necessary in the light of the overstimulation to which they are exposed in today's complex and digitised society. Difficulties in this age group are often interpreted as simple scholastic difficulties, neglecting the affective and bodily components that will manifest themselves more clearly in later development. In fact, pre-adolescence involves a break in the pre-existing personality structure; intervening in this critical phase, in which the symptoms can affect the child's overall functioning, is not easy if the previous years are not taken into due consideration. In order to counter the risk of a superficial view of latency - often 'forgotten' even by parents, who mainly remember their children's early childhood - the book aims to integrate different points of view in an evolutionary perspective.

Adriana Grotta
she has a degree in Modern Literature and Psychology and a psychoanalytic background. She is a psychologist, psychotherapist and team coordinator. She has published contributions on psychoanalytic issues in various journals and books, particularly in Psychotherapy and Human Sciences. She is co-editor of the Clinical Cases section of the journal Psychotherapy and Human Sciences.

Paola Morra
a graduate in Physics and Psychology, she specialised in psychodiagnostics and psychotherapy of the developmental age at the Fondazione Bonaccorsi in 1990. She then continued her training by participating for 10 years in the Milanese Seminars of Psychotherapy and Human Sciences, expanding her field of interest to adult psychotherapy. Since 2006, she has been co-editor of the Clinical Cases section of the journal Psychotherapy and Human Sciences.