ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the development of object relationships, with special reference to the role of affect in that development. It explores how the theory of object relationships can be integrated into the psychoanalytic psychology. The answer lies in the application of the ideas, and in propositions that follow regarding the role of feeling states in the psychoanalytic theory of mental functioning. It was appropriate, for some considerable time during the development of psychoanalytic theory, to regard an object relationship as the "cathexis of an object" with libidinal energy. The chapter considers interpersonal relationships within the framework of the intrapsychic psychoanalytic psychology, by taking into account the various hidden ways in which people attempt to actualize their conscious and unconscious wishes and the object relationships reflected in the individual's wishful phantasies. The capacity to create and manipulate phantasies and thoughts in an active fashion will occur well after the first months of life.
