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Object Relations Theory and Clinical Psychoanalysis
Object Relations Theory and Clinical Psychoanalysis is a collection of Kernberg's papers published or presented during the period from 1966 to 1975, with some new material included as well.
- GenresPsychologyPsychoanalysis
300 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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July 19, 2017
As usual, I'm reviewing this because there are no others yet, not because I'm really qualified to do so.
The mere fact that you're reading this review indicates that (1) you don't need to be warned in advance that a book with "Clinical Psychoanalysis" in the title is a tough read, and (2) reading it will be worth your time anyway. Even as a tourist, I found that this book usefully clarified important concepts and suggested many further lines of inquiry. Kernberg here is admirably painstaking in teasing out where he has followed earlier theorists and where he parts ways with them and why; my to-read list ballooned while I was reading this book. He also repeats himself excessively from chapter to chapter, but in this case that is a good thing as it helps the important concepts to sink in. I'm a completist glutton-for-punishment myself, but non-specialists could absolutely be forgiven for skipping the long final chapter on hospital administration. The remainder of the book is unequivocally recommended.
The mere fact that you're reading this review indicates that (1) you don't need to be warned in advance that a book with "Clinical Psychoanalysis" in the title is a tough read, and (2) reading it will be worth your time anyway. Even as a tourist, I found that this book usefully clarified important concepts and suggested many further lines of inquiry. Kernberg here is admirably painstaking in teasing out where he has followed earlier theorists and where he parts ways with them and why; my to-read list ballooned while I was reading this book. He also repeats himself excessively from chapter to chapter, but in this case that is a good thing as it helps the important concepts to sink in. I'm a completist glutton-for-punishment myself, but non-specialists could absolutely be forgiven for skipping the long final chapter on hospital administration. The remainder of the book is unequivocally recommended.
April 22, 2024
As mentioned in the previous post (my Facebook post), we are hunting for the primary datum of consciousness, in order for a viable and universal psychology can be prescribed and applied. And we believed that the primary datum of consciousness must be indivisible and simple, and that datum would be the proposition “The World exists”.
Yet the World as it appears to us, do not appears independently. It is a result of a transcendental synthesis between sensibilia and understanding. As the great Kant pointed out, sensibilia without understanding is blind, and understanding without sensibilia is empty. And this transcendental synthesis is carried out necessarily by the Subject. Yet even this Subject as it appears to us as a specific body, is by itself a phenomenon. The World and even the body unfolds to us as a relation; that the World and our body exists only in relation to my perception.
The existence of the things seen can only make sense as an experience when we experienced it. And the existence of the things unseen, such as the existence of London right now, is carried out by the regulative function of understanding by inference (the World as I perceives exists, thus so does London) and by appealing to the inertia of memory. To conclude, existence of things seen and unseen unfolds to us as a result of analysis. An analysis of relation, which subconsciously carried out by the organ of intuition.
This relation of the World does not come as it is readily upon birth. It is made, through progressive differentiation of the simple, brute Will into an integrated ego. And this is where the fundamentals of object relation theory shares similarity with psychoanalysis of relationality.
Firstly, the body and stream of thoughts we labelled as our identity does not come a priori, but only synthetically. It is a phenomenon that only proceeds from the unknowable parcel of Being. And this parcel of Being upon its invagination to the world of phenomenon, only knows its persistence in existence in the phenomenal world. In other words, the baby born is an objectified parcel of Being we called as the Will. It is called as the Will as its first principle of existence is to remain existent, and every Will requires a Willer, and thus the Willer precedes the objectified Will, which presented itself as the particular baby.
This brute force of Will knows no limits nor boundaries except in demanding for the continuity of its existence. The baby wailed and wailed and found the Mother provides sustenance for it to remain in existence. And as the Mother merely continues her role while the babe still in the womb as the sustainer, the infant knows no differentiation between itself and the Mother. The Mother is a mere consequent of it exerting its Will, and thus have no separate existence from it, as much as the hand conceived as ours when we demands it to move, if moves.
The existence of the Father gradually disrupted this Edenic yet undifferentiated, symbiotic existence. By separating the child from the mother intermittently, the Father introduced a dynamic new input that the child interprets as Death, as the child is now being separated from its sustainer, thus exposing itself to real possibility of passing away out of existence. Paradoxically, continuous interaction with the Father provides a steady amount of "micro-cuts" that the infant gradually interprets and internalises as the existence of a second object aside from itself; the possibility of the World now budding. Through the Father, the World is born for the child.
Object relation theory proceeds almost similarly with my observation as above. A child possesses primary autonomous apparatus of perception that continuously internalises and introjects impulses from without. Initially it is only available in the form of pain and pleasure, but gradually the infant can conceive a spectrum of affects from these two simple forms. A child gradually develops from conceiving the breast as an "all-good" object solely, to include wider selection of associated inputs into the sphere; the warmth of the mother's skin et cetera.
Thus a relation is born, and the infant gradually achieves self-consciousness through the process of introjection. And it is further refined to a point that the infant can consider between a positive and a negative valence affects. Differentiation between the two is needed so the positive valence can be selectively introjected in time gradually forming an ego nuclei, while the negative valence must be kept bay as a "not-me" entity. This leads to a second stage of differentiation which is called as identification. The infant started to identify with the default valence (in most case, the positive ones) and create a conception of the idealized self. And the failure to achieve the perpetuation of the positive valence, results into a failure to actualize the idealized self, and this results into guilt. Guilt, or conscience is needed, as an impetus of actualization of a better self. The stage of identification is usually achieved when the child can mimic the Mother's smile.
The formation of a more differentiated self gradually results to an integrated self that possesses a healthy boundary between the ego and the World. That, while negative valence is a given in the World, it is "not-me" and the guilt function to prevent the “not-me” to be discharged to the world in the form of pathological projection. As this “not-me” is readily known as not part of myself, I do not need to be insecure with the fact of it, and there’s no need to discharge it so I can maintain myself as the “good object”. This is the quintessential idea in object relation theory.
Returning back to our discussion. As existence is a constitutive act of existentiating, unfolded by analysis and yielding of a relation between the Self and the World, a correct relation between the two must be maintained. Individualized pattern of valence experienced by the persona created polychromic coloring to one’s existence. And the coloring induced a specific reaction that tied to it necessarily; the totality of idiosyncratic reaction towards the relationality in the World is what we called as the personality.
The personality is the inertia of existing; we are known through it, but not of it. It is not the sole product of nature nor nurture, but a dynamic interaction between the two. A predominant emphasis towards the subject is called as chthonic libidinal direction, while empyrean if towards the object. And the resulting defence in maintaining the integrated self in response to the dysequilibrium is either by merging with the predominant locus by enmeshment, or exerting independence from it through individuation.
The final imprinting by the 2nd year of life determines the level of organization of the personality; anankastic, chimerical or daemonic. As the Self gradually met with multiple inputs, it can respond with different pole of libido-integration pole, but must always with the same level of organization. For an example, a daemonic person can respond to an object of love through empyrean-individuation mode of narcisssism, that in homing onto the girl, he exerts himself onto her as merely an object; a classic example of Don Juanism. He can only responds towards the love interest with narcissistic negligence, but never with a chimerical level of histrionicity, where the object of love now is related as a mere discharge destination, rather than as an inanimate object by the narcissist.
Thus, according to the theory of relationality, experience is the primary datum of consciousness. An inertia in interpreting it results to the coloring of personality, but how about its pathology?
Neuroticism results from an excessive emphasis of the subject in the act of abstraction and introspection. The subject never exists as concrete as any discrete object found in the world. It only exists as a necessary pole of unity of consciousness, but never as an independent entity. A husband can only make sense when one has a wife, and the Self can only exist in relation of a World it inhabits, either physically or intelligibly in the higher spheres of existence. A synthetic creation of Self through introspection is akin to erecting a four-walled contraption; a bad faith.
Psychosis, on the other hand, results from complete lack of relation and differentiation between the subject and the object. External impulses are interpreted as the internal and vice versa.
Thus, we have delineated the a basic principle in psychoanalysis of relationality. It is through a correct application of analysis of the World as it unfolds as a relation to us, can we achieve an equilibrium; nafs al-mutmainnah. And this can be achieved through a helpful method of bracketing the “bad” experience into epochs, and to be analyzed and then dispersed back into Reality without any abstraction, or diffusion.
Yet the World as it appears to us, do not appears independently. It is a result of a transcendental synthesis between sensibilia and understanding. As the great Kant pointed out, sensibilia without understanding is blind, and understanding without sensibilia is empty. And this transcendental synthesis is carried out necessarily by the Subject. Yet even this Subject as it appears to us as a specific body, is by itself a phenomenon. The World and even the body unfolds to us as a relation; that the World and our body exists only in relation to my perception.
The existence of the things seen can only make sense as an experience when we experienced it. And the existence of the things unseen, such as the existence of London right now, is carried out by the regulative function of understanding by inference (the World as I perceives exists, thus so does London) and by appealing to the inertia of memory. To conclude, existence of things seen and unseen unfolds to us as a result of analysis. An analysis of relation, which subconsciously carried out by the organ of intuition.
This relation of the World does not come as it is readily upon birth. It is made, through progressive differentiation of the simple, brute Will into an integrated ego. And this is where the fundamentals of object relation theory shares similarity with psychoanalysis of relationality.
Firstly, the body and stream of thoughts we labelled as our identity does not come a priori, but only synthetically. It is a phenomenon that only proceeds from the unknowable parcel of Being. And this parcel of Being upon its invagination to the world of phenomenon, only knows its persistence in existence in the phenomenal world. In other words, the baby born is an objectified parcel of Being we called as the Will. It is called as the Will as its first principle of existence is to remain existent, and every Will requires a Willer, and thus the Willer precedes the objectified Will, which presented itself as the particular baby.
This brute force of Will knows no limits nor boundaries except in demanding for the continuity of its existence. The baby wailed and wailed and found the Mother provides sustenance for it to remain in existence. And as the Mother merely continues her role while the babe still in the womb as the sustainer, the infant knows no differentiation between itself and the Mother. The Mother is a mere consequent of it exerting its Will, and thus have no separate existence from it, as much as the hand conceived as ours when we demands it to move, if moves.
The existence of the Father gradually disrupted this Edenic yet undifferentiated, symbiotic existence. By separating the child from the mother intermittently, the Father introduced a dynamic new input that the child interprets as Death, as the child is now being separated from its sustainer, thus exposing itself to real possibility of passing away out of existence. Paradoxically, continuous interaction with the Father provides a steady amount of "micro-cuts" that the infant gradually interprets and internalises as the existence of a second object aside from itself; the possibility of the World now budding. Through the Father, the World is born for the child.
Object relation theory proceeds almost similarly with my observation as above. A child possesses primary autonomous apparatus of perception that continuously internalises and introjects impulses from without. Initially it is only available in the form of pain and pleasure, but gradually the infant can conceive a spectrum of affects from these two simple forms. A child gradually develops from conceiving the breast as an "all-good" object solely, to include wider selection of associated inputs into the sphere; the warmth of the mother's skin et cetera.
Thus a relation is born, and the infant gradually achieves self-consciousness through the process of introjection. And it is further refined to a point that the infant can consider between a positive and a negative valence affects. Differentiation between the two is needed so the positive valence can be selectively introjected in time gradually forming an ego nuclei, while the negative valence must be kept bay as a "not-me" entity. This leads to a second stage of differentiation which is called as identification. The infant started to identify with the default valence (in most case, the positive ones) and create a conception of the idealized self. And the failure to achieve the perpetuation of the positive valence, results into a failure to actualize the idealized self, and this results into guilt. Guilt, or conscience is needed, as an impetus of actualization of a better self. The stage of identification is usually achieved when the child can mimic the Mother's smile.
The formation of a more differentiated self gradually results to an integrated self that possesses a healthy boundary between the ego and the World. That, while negative valence is a given in the World, it is "not-me" and the guilt function to prevent the “not-me” to be discharged to the world in the form of pathological projection. As this “not-me” is readily known as not part of myself, I do not need to be insecure with the fact of it, and there’s no need to discharge it so I can maintain myself as the “good object”. This is the quintessential idea in object relation theory.
Returning back to our discussion. As existence is a constitutive act of existentiating, unfolded by analysis and yielding of a relation between the Self and the World, a correct relation between the two must be maintained. Individualized pattern of valence experienced by the persona created polychromic coloring to one’s existence. And the coloring induced a specific reaction that tied to it necessarily; the totality of idiosyncratic reaction towards the relationality in the World is what we called as the personality.
The personality is the inertia of existing; we are known through it, but not of it. It is not the sole product of nature nor nurture, but a dynamic interaction between the two. A predominant emphasis towards the subject is called as chthonic libidinal direction, while empyrean if towards the object. And the resulting defence in maintaining the integrated self in response to the dysequilibrium is either by merging with the predominant locus by enmeshment, or exerting independence from it through individuation.
The final imprinting by the 2nd year of life determines the level of organization of the personality; anankastic, chimerical or daemonic. As the Self gradually met with multiple inputs, it can respond with different pole of libido-integration pole, but must always with the same level of organization. For an example, a daemonic person can respond to an object of love through empyrean-individuation mode of narcisssism, that in homing onto the girl, he exerts himself onto her as merely an object; a classic example of Don Juanism. He can only responds towards the love interest with narcissistic negligence, but never with a chimerical level of histrionicity, where the object of love now is related as a mere discharge destination, rather than as an inanimate object by the narcissist.
Thus, according to the theory of relationality, experience is the primary datum of consciousness. An inertia in interpreting it results to the coloring of personality, but how about its pathology?
Neuroticism results from an excessive emphasis of the subject in the act of abstraction and introspection. The subject never exists as concrete as any discrete object found in the world. It only exists as a necessary pole of unity of consciousness, but never as an independent entity. A husband can only make sense when one has a wife, and the Self can only exist in relation of a World it inhabits, either physically or intelligibly in the higher spheres of existence. A synthetic creation of Self through introspection is akin to erecting a four-walled contraption; a bad faith.
Psychosis, on the other hand, results from complete lack of relation and differentiation between the subject and the object. External impulses are interpreted as the internal and vice versa.
Thus, we have delineated the a basic principle in psychoanalysis of relationality. It is through a correct application of analysis of the World as it unfolds as a relation to us, can we achieve an equilibrium; nafs al-mutmainnah. And this can be achieved through a helpful method of bracketing the “bad” experience into epochs, and to be analyzed and then dispersed back into Reality without any abstraction, or diffusion.
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October 21, 2025Alcune citazioni
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Relazioni oggettuali: rappresentazioni diadiche come riflessi dell'originario rapporto infante-madre e il suo successivo sviluppo in relazioni interpersonali
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La "convalida" intrapsichica è il processo ininterrotto che consiste nel riplasmare il mondo delle rappresentazioni oggettuali sotto l'influenza del principio di realtà, della maturazione e dello sviluppo dell'Io, e attraverso cicli di proiezione e introiezione.
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Il mondo interno non solo plasma la percezione di quello esterno, ma influenza, attraverso la struttura del carattere, il campo interpersonale dell'individuo.
--
Più è profonda la conoscenza del Sé, più lo è anche quella degli altri.
--
Tutti i transfert riepilogano fantasie infantili, esperienze reali e formazioni difensive contro di essi, ed è spesso difficile distinguere le fantasie dalla realtà.
--
In tutti noi è possibile l'attivazione di livelli primitivi di funzionamento psicologico quando la normale struttura sociale è persa, i normali ruoli sociali sono sospesi e oggetti multipli sono presenti simultaneamente in una relazione non strutturata (riproducendo così relazioni oggettuali intrapsichiche primitive).
--
Relazioni oggettuali: rappresentazioni diadiche come riflessi dell'originario rapporto infante-madre e il suo successivo sviluppo in relazioni interpersonali
--
La "convalida" intrapsichica è il processo ininterrotto che consiste nel riplasmare il mondo delle rappresentazioni oggettuali sotto l'influenza del principio di realtà, della maturazione e dello sviluppo dell'Io, e attraverso cicli di proiezione e introiezione.
--
Il mondo interno non solo plasma la percezione di quello esterno, ma influenza, attraverso la struttura del carattere, il campo interpersonale dell'individuo.
--
Più è profonda la conoscenza del Sé, più lo è anche quella degli altri.
--
Tutti i transfert riepilogano fantasie infantili, esperienze reali e formazioni difensive contro di essi, ed è spesso difficile distinguere le fantasie dalla realtà.
--
In tutti noi è possibile l'attivazione di livelli primitivi di funzionamento psicologico quando la normale struttura sociale è persa, i normali ruoli sociali sono sospesi e oggetti multipli sono presenti simultaneamente in una relazione non strutturata (riproducendo così relazioni oggettuali intrapsichiche primitive).
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