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Addressing a sense of self, a sense of the object, and a selfobject experience of enlivenment and cohesion connected self psychology to the subjectivity of intersubjectivity. The second far- reaching revision was the proposal by Stolorow (1997) of intersubjectivity. Borrowing from philosophy particularly Husserl, Stolorow introduced intersubjectivity as a broad principle necessary for and inherent in human relatedness. Here, all development occurs within an intersubjective field , an intersection of individual subjectivities. In its broadest conception, “ intersubjectivity denotes neither a mode of experiencing nor a sharing of experience, but the contextual pre-condition for having any experience at all” (Stolorow, 2013, p. 385, original italics). Infant research (Beebe & Lachmann, 2002) and developmental theories validate the claim that caregiver-infant intersubjective interactions set the pattern and tone of relatedness. Less broadly, intersubjectivity is used to account for moment-to-moment alteration of affects, intentions, and goals of each individual in a dyadic, triadic, or group relationship. In analytic therapy, intersubjectivity, understood as the interplay of subjectivities of analyst and analysand, shifts the traditional emphasis on transference and countertransference to an expanded expression of the analyst’s subjective experience. This redefinition of the analyst’s role in the dyadic relationship creates a “more reciprocal (yet, still asymmetrical) subject-to-subject intimacy” (Lichtenberg, Lachmann, & Fosshage, 2016, p. 86-87). The subjectivity of intersubjectivity refers to the individual’s awareness of affects, intentions, goals, perspectives, and reflections about him or herself. Additionally, as emphasized in self psychology and attachment theory, subject-to-subject intimacy is based on and necessary for each person to sense into the state of mind, perspective and strivings of the other (empathy [Kohut, 1971] and mentalization [Fonagy, Gergely, Jurist, & Target 2002]). Along with helping to account for empathic perception, intersubjectivity helps to explain three other concepts central to Self Psychology: a focus on adaptive strivings, disruption-restoration sequences, and the ambiance that develops in the field. In its focal point of entry into developments in the intersubjective analytic field, Self Psychology tends to give precedence to inferences about a patient’s positive strivings (leading edge) while many other relational theories give precedence to interpreting maladaptive conflictual strivings (following, trailing edge). Intersubjectivity has been instrumental in the recognition of the significance of the ambiance , the general affective state, that is more than the individual subjectivities of the members of any intimate dyad. The ambiance that forms in the intersubjective field of an ongoing analysis has a profound effect on both analyst and analysand and the outcome of the treatment III. Ab. Relational Perspectives In the Relational Perspective, Intersubjectivity, often understood to be overlapping or synonymous with interpersonal, relational or bipersonal, is meant to encompass psychic experiences that emerge and are constituted and experienced in a dyadic or multi-element system.
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