ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how psychotherapists and other practitioners understand intersubjectivity and subjectivity in relation to the self, using the understanding of Colwyn Trevarthen and K. J. Aitken, to which they have added that of Daniel Stern and of Robert Emde. Attachment theory discusses two major longterm affective states to which infants and children are exposed by their closest caregivers. In childhood many of the children who have been deprived of personal experience with supportive caregivers can recognize supportive interest sharing relationships when they watch how other caregivers respond to children in their care. D. Heard and B. Lake focused on two periods: period during which infancy is left behind and childhood is established; period of adolescence in which major physiological changes take place that lead a child to become an adult so far as physical development in concerned. They finally decided to handle the question of identity by hypothesizing that a self has two quite separate sources of identity.
