This book, the exciting collaboration of a developmental psychoanalyst
at the forefront of functional magnetic resonance attachment research
and a leading neurobiological researcher on mirror neurons, presents a
fresh and innovative look at intersubjectivity from a neurobiological
and developmental perspective. Grounding their analysis of
intersubjectivity in the newest advances from developmental
neuroscience, modern attachment theory, and relational psychoanalysis,
Massimo Ammaniti and Vittorio Gallese illustrate how brain development
changes simultaneously with relationally induced alterations in the
subjectivities of both mother and infant.
Ammaniti and Gallese combine extensive current interdisciplinary
research with in-depth clinical interviews that highlight the expectant
mother's changing subjective states and the various typologies of
maternal representations. Building on Gallese's seminal work with mirror
neurons and embodied simulation theory, the authors construct a model of
intersubjectivity that stresses not symbolic representations but
intercorporeality from a second-person perspective. Charting the
prenatal and perinatal events that serve as the neurobiological
foundation for postnatal reciprocal affective communications, they
conclude with direct clinical applications of early assessments and
interventions, including interventions with pregnant mothers.
This volume is essential for clinicians specializing in attachment
disorders and relational trauma, child psychotherapists, infant mental
health workers, pediatricians, psychoanalysts, and developmental
researchers. It combines fascinating new information and illustrative
clinical experience to illustrate the early intersubjective origins of
our own and our patients' internal worlds.
