Operational thinking at adolescence in relation to psychosomatic disorder

This article represents an attempt from a developmental point of view to construct theoretical links between psychic and somatic functioning as they are manifest in psychosomatic illness and to relate this process to the types of thinking — preoperational and operational — that determine the insights into disease available to the adolescent mind.Presented at the International Congress of Pediatrics at New Delhi, India, October 26, 1977.Received his M.D. from University of London. Major interests include research on childhood psychopathology in relation to parenting.