Abstract
The subject of theoretical revision is the impairment of social cognition, which is wellknown in the clinics of borderline personality disorders. Mentalization is understood as a form of social cognition, which allows to perceive, imagine and emotionally relate, make sense and causality of what’s happening in a subjective world – of self and another person. Mentalization supposes integration of contextual factors, material and physical aspects of situation and behavior, as well as inner subjective feelings, beliefs, goals and intentional states as representative motives for a given behavior. In the perspective of the cultural-historical theory and methodology by L.S. Vygotsky a new interpretation is offered for the clinical phenomena of mentalizationdeficit, an understanding is given for transformation of its structure and functions as a consequence of the person’s loss of interpsychic social connections and disintegration of intrapsychic organization of consciousness, impairment of its systemic structure, narrowing and simplification of cross-functional bonds and intrapsychic “mythology”. In the result of this double destruction of bonds, ontogenetically early and primitiveforms of mentalization are «splitting off», isolated and start holding a domineering position in psychic functioning. The process of mentalization regresses to its pre-categorical and cognitive-affective non-differentiated levels and structures (syncretic and complex organization), unfolding involuntarily and unconsciously, lacking meaningful coherence, symbolic mediation and focus for understanding thesubjective world – of self and the Other. The unconscious substitution of the psychic picture of the inner world with impulsive actions, hypochondriac and narcissistic fixations, autistic pseudo-mentalization and manipulation is lacking the meaningful and sanguineous dialogue with the Other. The loss of social connections (interpsychic communication), without being mediated by the addressed to the Other speech dialogue is interiorized into the inner “muteness” – the loss of not only understanding of others, but the interruption of meaningful inner and “worded” dialogue with the self, self-understanding.
 Keywords: mentalization disorders, cultural-historical approach, structure-functional disorganization.
Highlights
Ability of a person to consider one’s Self and the world of subjectivity of the Other as subjects of inquiry implies an intricate interplay and interweaving of emotional and reflexive processes, demands flexible decentering the Self to a position of an imaginable other person, which is attainable only in the interpersonal communication, open for the dialogue-meeting with the Other as a human being possessing equal values and rights
Fonagy calls “psychic equivalence”, are the decrease in the regime of its functioning, which manifests in excessive concretization and rigidity in understanding psychic states; a belief that subjective representations absolutely accurately and univocally reflect reality as its photographic copies; non-admission of alternative interpretations, lack of ability to doubt the accuracy and limits of own thoughts; saturation of representations with affects of paranoid hostility, idealization and grandiosity [10]
In the optics of cultural-historical theory, the described group of phenomena appears as qualitatively heterogeneous: it includes phenomena, which pertain to various structural organizations and levels of regress of cognitive organization of consciousness; which differ in degree of differentiation and symbolic mediation, emotional and motivational investment and understanding of causal relations between one’s own and other people intentions and behavior
Summary
Ability of a person to consider one’s Self and the world of subjectivity of the Other as subjects of inquiry implies an intricate interplay and interweaving of emotional and reflexive processes, demands flexible decentering the Self to a position of an imaginable other person, which is attainable only in the interpersonal communication, open for the dialogue-meeting with the Other as a human being possessing equal values and rights. The space between the Self and the Other, the space of the joint and shared intersubjectivity and “collective intentionality” is viewed as a “place”, where the “triangular” process of production of mutual mental representations unfolds [1]. Mentalization, as defined by a British psychoanalyst Peter Fonagy, is understood as a form of social cognition, which allows perceiving, imagining, emotionally relating, making sense and seeing causality in something taking place in one’s own and other person’s subjective world. Mentalization implies integration of contextual factors, material and physical aspects of situation and behavior, as well as inner subjective feelings, beliefs, goals and intentional states as representative incentives of various behaviors [2]
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