This Changes Everything: The Relational Revolution in Psychology

We are, therefore I am: an introduction to and political history of the psychology of relationships. In 1977, Carol Gilligan published the essay In a Different Voice, describing the discrepancy in morality and self-expression between men and women. In a radical break with the Freudian school that dominated psychology, Gilligan and her peers identified relationships rather than the notion of self as the foundation of our psychological and physical states. Initially met with patronizing indulgence by colleagues, this essay, along with early work by the psychiatrists Judith Lewis Herman and Jean Baker Miller, would go on to radically alter the way we understand the psychology of women, shed new light on misunderstood conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder, and inspire a trove of bestselling and sometimes controversial books--ranging from Reviving Ophelia to Raising Cain and The Courage to Heal to You Just Don't Understand--that focused intense concern on childhood development, women's relationships, and psychological trauma. In This Changes Everything, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Christina Robb tells the story of relational psychology and recounts the untold work of a pioneering group of psychologists--mostly women--who at times took monumental risks, crossing boundaries and breaking institutional taboos, in order to fully understand the ways in which relationships shape our every experience of the world.

About the Author :
Christina Robb was for more than twenty years a writer for "The Boston Globe," where she was part of a team of journalists who won the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 1983. This is her first book.

Review :
"Christina Robb turns up the volume on a few quiet women who discovered the missing link between feminist politics and female reality. Their contribution to relational psychology really did 'change everything'--and Robb paints an exciting portrait of this paradigm shift."--Jennifer Baumgardner, co-author of Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future """"This Changes Everything" provides a long overdue service to three remarkable women whose contributions to our collective understanding of gender, politics, and psychology are truly immeasurable. Like many, much of my work is founded on these women's insights so it was wonderful to learn about their experiences as educators both inside and outside of their fields of expertise." --Rosalind Wiseman, author of Queen Bees and Wannabees "It is deliciously appropriate that in reading this fascinating account about relational psychology, you will become intimately connected with the psychologists who developed the field. "This Changes Everything" movingly and absorbingly describes their struggle to legitimate an entirely new, out-of-the-box way of thinking about human beings. Their work is nothing short of revolutionary: It has had an undeniable impact on politics, feminism, human rights movements, and, of course, personal relationships--literally changing people's lives. You will learn not only the history of relational psychology but about the very things you need to know to make and sustain fruitful human connections."--Leora Tanenbaum, author of "Slut! Growing Up Female With a Bad Reputation""and Catfight: Rivalries Among Women--From Diets to Dating, From the Boardroom to the Delivery Room " "At last we have an erudite and exciting history of the pioneers of relational psychology. Robb's narrative makes a page turner of a most unlikely story-- a group of feminist academics who changed the world one research paper at a time." --Mary Pipher, author of Reviving Ophelia