THOMAS FUCHS, HANNE DE-JAEGHER
Department of General Psychiatry, Section Phenomenological and Psychopathological Psychiatry, Centre for Psychosocial Medicine, University of Heidelberg, Germany

Non-Representational Intersubjectivity

Current theories of intersubjectivity are mainly based on a representationalist view: Concepts such as theory of mind, simulation or mentalization all have in common that they conceive of social understanding as a projection of inner representations onto others. The person who perceives another does not actually interact with her, but with internal models or simulations of her actions. Research into the 'social brain', particularly into the mirror neuron system, has favoured a third-person-paradigm of social cognition as a passive observation of others' behaviour, attributing it to an inferential, simulative or projective process in the individual brain. In our paper, we will present an alternative concept of intersubjectivity as an ongoing, dynamic process of participatory sense-making. Social understanding, as it develops in early infancy, is not realized as a 'single snapshot' activity of one individual, but arises in the course of a moment-tomoment interaction and coordination of two subjects. This process includes components of bodily resonance and imitation, rhythmic co-variation of gestures, facial and vocal expression, affect attunement, in-phase or phasedelayed behaviour, and recurrent sequences of matches, mismatches and repair. Primary intersubjectivity, then, is not a solitary task of deciphering or simulating the movements of others, but means skillful coping in social interactions and generating common meaning through them. From this point of view, explanations of social cognition on a one-way basis can only have limited value:
(1) Research on special brain modules only singles out one section or fragment of the ongoing cycles of interaction. In fact, neuronal mirror systems can only fulfill their functions as being embedded in a situational and intentional context.
(2) Concepts of social cognition on the basis of individual simulation or mentalization are derived from secondary forms of intersubjectivity which rather arise from states of detached observation or disturbed interaction. Despite those special developments, non-representational intersubjectivity remains the basis of our everyday social understanding.

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