ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author draws on social constructionism, interpersonal neurobiology, attachment theory, and third order thinking to explain why optimal human development requires ongoing mutually supportive relational bonds. The author uses a case example to apply two concepts—emotion and societal discourse—that link the individual and society and are core to Socio-Emotional Relationship Therapy (SERT). She explains why socio-relational inequities in the giving and receiving of care give rise to distress and clinical symptoms and why change happens interpersonally through the embodiment of a new viscerally salient experience. The chapter illustrates five guidelines that help readers connect emotional experience, societal discourse, identity, social and relational justice, and well-being: (a) reciprocal responsivity is essential to well-being, (b) emotional safety and connectedness are adaptive, (c) social discourse drives emotion, (d) identities and belonging are felt sociocultural experience, and (e) sociocultural value and emotional capital politicize well-being. Readers learn to view emotion intertwined with societal power contexts, as a braided link between the individual and the social world, and emotional safety and the experience of being known as sociocultural issues more accessible to some than to others.
