On Zoom only

(this activity is not recorded)

Implicit Non-Verbal Forms of Intersubjectivity in Infant Development
and Their Implications for Adult Treatment

Lien vers la version en français   Les formes implicites non-verbales d’intersubjectivité dans le développement du nourrisson
et ses implications pour le traitement des adultes

with Beatrice Beebe, Ph.D.*
Internationally renowned psychoanalyst and researcher

   Beatrice Beebe's PM presentation will be given in English, with simultaneous English interpretation for the audience questions in French during the question and answer period. And the AM introduction to the work of Beatrice Beebe will be given in French without simultaneous interpretation in English.

This conference is approved by the Ordre des psychologues du Québec for 6 hours of continuing education units (CEU) in psychotherapy. No OPQ: RA06855-25.

The conference

Previously centered on the intrapsychic functioning of a single subject, analytical psychotherapy has been completely transformed by the emergence of intersubjectivity theories. This systems-based view shifted the focus from the solitary subject to interactive systems, past (there and then) and present (here and now), and to the mutual influence between two subjectivities organized in different ways. Thus, it offers a model of the human psyche whose nature, emergence, development, and change are fundamentally interactive.

However, adult treatment theorists have mainly described intersubjectivity in its verbal, explicit modalities. Presuming a symbolic mind, they primarily work with the therapist and patient's ability to verbalize subjective, conscious, unconscious, and pre-reflective experience—the so- called talking cure. In contrast, research on very young children's development focuses on the implicit, procedural dimensions of communication in interactions with their caregiver—an action-based dialogue. Researchers in early childhood, including our guest speaker Beatrice Beebe, have discovered a highly complex world of nonverbal, implicit, bidirectional communication between the baby and the caregiving partner, organizing the expectations of each partner for future interactions. Babies communicate with us before they can use words, and nonverbal, procedural communication has a presymbolic meaning that has lasting effects on development. These fundamental nonverbal interaction processes underlie verbal communication and persist throughout life; they are therefore applicable to the therapeutic relationship and therapeutic change. For the clinician, it seems crucial to understand and integrate these two modalities of process to recognize their significance in therapeutic work.

Using a dyadic systems model of face-to-face communication, Beatrice Beebe demonstrates in 4-month mother-infant interactions that each person's actions are coordinated with those of the partner; that each person's behavior is affected both by their own immediately preceding behavior (self-contingency) and by that of the partner (interactive contingency). Both partners are active participants in the co-creation of relational patterns. Both actively create expectations of the process of relating. In addition to offering many highly significant metaphors to imagine with patients what has happened in their developmental history, the results of Beebe's research raise awareness of the bidirectional, implicit, nonverbal coordination process that underpins the verbal content of the therapeutic dialogue. Her theory of interaction also highlights the nonconscious, implicit, presymbolic level of our experience, whose organizational principles—shaped by our history—can be made explicit to a limited extent, but most importantly, can be transformed through the experience of the therapeutic relationship.

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Groupe d’étude sur l’intersubjectivité (GEI), we offer you the opportunity to meet this internationally renowned psychoanalyst and researcher, Beatrice Beebe. Before hearing her, Gabriel Lepage, assisted by Nathalie Parent, will present an introduction to her theory of interaction from a dyadic systems view which Beatrice Beebe developed with Frank Lachmann (2002, 2013, 2020) and other colleagues (2005, 2016).

In the afternoon, we will have the privilege of hearing from Dr. Beebe herself, who will provide an overview of her research which identifies 4-month patterns of interaction which predict secure vs. disorganized infant attachment at one year. Through microanalysis of face-to-face interactions between mothers and babies, her research has revealed deep difficulties among mothers in "entering" empathically into their infant’s states of distress. Dr. Beebe concludes that these infants fail to develop "the expectation of being felt, known, or recognized" by their mothers, especially when they are distressed. She notes that the attachment literature has documented those mothers of disorganized infant often have unresolved loss or abuse in their histories. She hypothesizes that the infant’s distress may trigger the mother’s own unresolved unbearable distress outside of her conscious awareness. Additionally, longitudinal studies have shown that disorganized attachment in a one-year-old predicts psychopathology in young adulthood, primarily marked by dissociation.

In contrast, when infants are distressed, certain behaviors, such as brief facial or vocal expressions of sadness, brief replication of the baby's crying rhythm, or of their dampened state, are modes of "entering" the baby’s distress, and seem to facilitate secure infant attachment. These behaviors seem to allow the infant to feel that someone is on the same wavelength and that their distress is recognized. Such nonverbal ways of entering into moments of distress thus provide an organizing principle not only for the optimal development of the baby, but also for therapeutic action in adult treatment.

Dr. Beebe will provide several video illustrations of these processes, first in the nonverbal communications between infants and their mothers, and then in adult therapy through videos of herself interacting with Sandra, an adult patient who had been unable to look at another person since the age of 12 (Sandberg & Beebe, 2020). We cordially invite you to register to this unique event.

Learning objectives

At the conclusion of this presentation, the participant will be able to:

1. Explain how the relational patterns are co-constructed from birth on in interaction with others.
2. Describe examples of maternal behaviors towards 4-month old’s infant distress in the origins of secure and disorganized 12-month attachment.
3. Describe some non-verbal procedural forms of intersubjectivity underpinning its verbal forms in adult treatment.
4. Identify one result from Dr Beebe’s research which could be applied to the therapeutic relationship and therapeutic action.

*The speaker
Presenters of the AM program

Gabriel Lepage, T.S. and Nathalie Parent, M.A., are psychotherapists in private practice who use a clinical approach based on Self Psychology and Intersubjective Systems Theory.

Mr. Lepage is a member of the Ordre des travailleurs sociaux du Québec and holds a psychotherapy permit from the Ordre des Psychologues du Québec.

Ms. Parent was a lecturer at Laval University from 2001 to 2020 and is the author of several articles, as well as a speaker and columnist in various media. She is a member of the Ordre des psychologues du Québec.

Beatrice Beebe's partial bibliography

The publication marked by an asterisk is available for purchase and download: see the page Paper by Sandberg & Beebe.

Beebe, B., Cohen, P. & Lachmann, F. (2016). The Mother-Infant Interaction Picture Book: Origins of Attachment. New York: Norton.

Beebe, B., Jaffe, J., & Lachmann, F. (1993). A Dyadic Systems View of Communication. In N. Skolnick & S. Warshaw (Eds.), Relational Perspectives in Psychoanalysis, (pp. 61–81). Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.

Beebe, B., Knoblauch, S., Rustin, J. & Sorter, D. (2005) Forms of Intersubjectivity in Infant Research and Adult Treatment. New York: Other Press.

Beebe, B. & Lachmann, F. (2002). Infant Research and Adult Treatment: Co-Constructing Interactions Hillsdale, NJ: The Analytic Press.

Beebe, B. & Lachmann, F. (2014). The Origins of Attachment: Infant Research and Adult Treatment New York, NY: Routledge.

Beebe, B. & Lachmann, F. (2020). Infant Research and Adult Treatment Revisited: Cocreating Self- and Interactive Regulation. Psychoanalytic Psychology, vol. 37, n° 4, pp. 313-323.

Beebe, B., Messinger, D., Bahrick, L.E., Margolis, A. & Buck, K.A. (2016) A Systems View of Mother-Infant Face-To-Face Communication. Developmental Psychology, vol. 52, n° 4, pp. 556-571.

*Sandberg, L.S. & Beebe, B. (2020) A Patient Who Does Not Look: A Collaborative Treatment With Video Feedback. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, vol. 30, n° 4, pp. 479-498.

Reading

The paper by Sandberg and Beebe (2020) A Patient Who Does Not Look: A Collaborative Treatment With Video Feedback recounts the collaborative treatment of a patient undergoing analysis with Sandberg, who agrees to have video feedback treatment sessions with Beatrice Beebe. In her presentation, Beatrice Beebe will allow us to view some of these video recordings. It is not required to read this article in order to well understand the presentation but it could enhance your learning experience. It is available at a cost of 5$ (for copyright fees) at this page: Paper by Sandberg and Beebe.

Schedule

15 minutes a.m. and p.m. breaks

09:00 am	Opening of the Zoom waiting room
09:15 am	Zoom admission
09:30 am	Introduction to the work of Beatrice Beebe by Gabriel Lepage and Nathalie Parent Discussion with audience
12:30 pm	Lunch time
01:30 pm	Presentation by Beatrice Beebe Discussion with audience
04:30 pm	End

Q&A with the speaker

Participants will be able to ask their questions verbally or to write them in the Zoom "Chat".

Poster to distribute

Poster of the GEI 20th Anniversary Conference with Beatrice Beebe

Organizing committee

Annette Richard, psychologist, administrator
Caroline Dumont, psychologist, president
Gabriel Lepage, social worker, administrator
and Nathalie Parent, psychologist