Father to Daughter

I say Freud, you say Sigmund. But the Freud family fostered more than one famous psychologist. Sigmund Freud’s sixth and youngest child became famous in her own right. Born on this day in 1895, Anna’s early childhood dreams featured in her father’s books. She began to delve into these publications during her mid-twenties, while recovering from an illness that had forced her to retire from teaching. This reading led her to pursue her own research on the psychoanalysis of children, and the role of a person’s ego in preventing depression. She was questioned about this work at a Gestapo headquarters after Nazi Germany invaded Austria, in 1938. The Freud family fled to London where Anna studied the effects of war-time stress on children. She set up a centre to care for those separated from their families during the war. Today, the Anna Freud charity promotes health and wellbeing among children.

Written by Deborah Oakley

Deborah Oakley

Writer

Deborah is researching healthy cognitive ageing at the University of Cambridge. She previously worked as a science communicator in London, working closely with the BPoD team.

• This image of Sigmund and his daughter Anna Freud is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division
• Published on Wikimedia Commons
• Image is in the public domain