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ABSTRACTThe authors discuss the relevance of aesthetic and affective experience at the heart of the human being’s capability to relate to the world and to found relations of sense. Faced with anguish that the world can be meaningless and with fear of uncertainty/chaos, trust and hope are needed for the world to be a hospitable place for existence. Such experience is aesthetic, sensitive and affective before being rational, reflective and deliberative. Through a dialogue between Kant, Winnicott and Bion, it is shown how foundation of trust is based on two essential aspects: (1) The illusionthat reality was created to allow us to live in it (namely, the fictionalityis a prerequisite for each possible development of psyche) and (2) this illusion is not generated by a solipsistic activity of the human mind; rather, it is made possible starting from the primordial relationship with the other, by containing anguish, nourishing trust and hope, and supporting psychic development and elaboration of progressive forms of symbolisation. The authors discuss how these points have a profound aesthetic implication through deepening the reflection on the ontogenetic development of the psyche, the complex intertwining between primary and secondary processes, and clinical implications.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) represents a pervasive neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by persistent atypicalities in social communication and social interactions across different domains of life, often with restricted, repetitive, stereotyped patterns of behaviors, interests, and activities. A large corpus of previous research shows that parental involvement in caregiving is perceived as stressful and challenging, in many cases resulting in poorer parental quality of life. The authors present a quali-quantitative mixed method research on sensemaking process of 34 parents (16 mothers and 18 fathers) of children with ASD. The interviews were collected and analyzed according to the “Sense of Grip” (SoG) methodology. SoG indeed refers to the sensemaking processes that a person realizes to manage the relationship with diseases or disorders by organizing several degrees of flexibility, differentiation, and adaptation to the variability of experiences and contexts of life. This construct of health psychology—semiotically and clinically oriented—is based on specific narrative functions (i.e., temporal, integrative, emotional, sharing, and agentive functions). The cluster analysis procedure allowed to identify three different SoG profiles: (a) enterprising(parents who are able to construct flexible and dynamic familiar routines), (b) opposing(parents who experience the ASD disorder as a deep unacceptable crisis, hindering the rest of familiar and professional activities), and (c) condescending(parents who organize family life completely on adherence to medical prescriptions and care protocols). These profiles show interesting implications for clinical practice and support as showing specific aspects of treating, managing, and sharing children conditions within family and relational contexts of life.

This article presents the results of a theoretical investigation that aimed to develop a comprehensive model regarding the phenomenon of imagination and private speech as liminal experiences of consciousness. A theoretical articulation between the phenomena was developed to explain how imagination and private speech allow to make sense in the liminal space between inner and outer worlds. It is concluded that the double role of iconic and verbal signs allows to configure future experiences and to construct meanings in the transitional space between oneself and others. The iconic and verbal signs used in imaginative and private speech processes, respectively, allow to experience situations ‘as if they were real’, and at the same time, to distance from them as a mental play separated from reality. This is all based on an affective matrix which determines the emergence of mental meanings and mental content. This article constitutes a contribution to the study of micro-genetic intrapsychic liminal processes.

The article investigates the role of affectivity in the construction of the pre-reflective experience, that is, the mode of experience that directs and guides the organism in a rapid and immediate adaptation to the environment. According to a multidisciplinary approach that brings together affective neuroscience, psychology, and psychoanalysis, emotions and affects are considered as matrices of thought, mental development, agency and generation of cognitive and psychobiological regulation models. The connection between emotions, psychobiological regulation and learning is investigated focusing on the enhancement of the unconscious nature of these processes and their relational matrix, consistently with the theories of Bion and Bowlby. In order to re-evaluate the fundamental link between affectivity and corporeity, we introduce the PNEI perspective on an integration of the new biology (anti-reductionist and inspired by the epigenetic research) with the psychological disciplines and the humanities. According with a network model, it is also discussed the Schore’s proposal of a possible welding between the second generation attachment theory and affect regulation theory, on the basis of some recent and complex models of mind-body integration.

Purpose: Consistent with current literature, which highlights the role of narration as a key tool for exploring the processes by which people construct the meaning of their critical experiences the authors propose a theoretical and methodological model to analyse the narratives of illness and identify any innovative aspects. The generative model of mind presented refers to a semiotic, narrative and socio-constructivist perspective according to which narration constitutes one of the possible processes by which the affective and pre-verbal sense of experience is transformed into a meaning that can be symbolized and shared. Design/methodology/approach: The onset of an illness represents a critical event which interrupts a person's life narrative, shattering his/her biographical continuity and undermining any assumptions of him/herself and the world. In particular, the model proposes a method of analysis, currently absent in literature, of the narrative interview Narrative Function Coding System (NFC) in order to grasp the ways by which four main narrative functions, namely psychic functions, are classified: the search for meaning, the expression of emotions, the temporal organization and the orientation to action. Findings: NFC appears to be able to capture the complexity of the narrative process of construction of illness' sense-meaning making process, identifying both representative modalities of good functioning, which express a gradual process of connection with the variability of the experience, and modalities that express moments of disorganization and rigidity, which can persist throughout the time of treatment. The NFC represents not only a method for analysing illness narratives but also a method for tracking and monitoring the process of clinical intervention and change. Originality/value: The sense-meaning making process perspective within the narrative socio-constructivist and semiotic framework of analysis proposed by NFC is currently absent in the literature. NFC can be a device for analysing the narrative process of sense-meaning making both for its use for clinical and preventive purposes. In addition we believe that this method, which focuses on the “form” and “way” of narratively constructing the subjective experience, rather than on the specific thematic content, can be used with all types of illness narratives, in particular the longitudinal one to explore the changes in sense-meaning making process.

Authors discuss the topic of inclusion process in academic education from a semiotic and dynamic perspective. Inclusive experience in educational and academic context is constructed through the personalization of the processes of sensemaking within a wider cultural and shared social context. Authors have implemented an innovative tool for a qualitative research about sensemaking processes. They create the upside down world narrative methodology, namely, a double task of narrating one’s own experience in two times, asking participants to turn upside down their narration. Such a device allows grasping the inherent and constitutive ambivalence of each psychological process of sensemaking. Results of semiotic narrative analysis show that inclusion appears narratively articulated on two broadly generalized domains of sense as follows: the relationship with others and the training path.