Mutually driven ideation and occasions of interpersonal transcendence

摘要

In various intellectual traditions and scholarly disciplines, we find efforts at describing, and in some cases explicating, immersive experiences of interpersonal engagement marked by feelings of insight, connection, and personal growth. Drawing upon elements of the action-assembly-theory approach to understanding message-relevant thought and overt behavior, this article presents a theoretically-derived conception of "interpersonal transcendence": intense occasions of interpersonally-driven insight and connection that arise when conversational partners pose, and assist in resolving, assembly difficulties for each other. The essay examines individual, relationship, and situational factors theorized to play a role in transcendent experiences and discusses research strategies for studying interpersonal transcendence and possible areas for future research.