'Hatching' from symbiosis (Mahler, 1968) is described as the emergence of integrational ability, the infant's capacity to integrate simultaneous information from multiple sources. It transforms the infant's early involuntary connexion to his milieu into the intentionality of conscious thought. Attention, originally evoked by single stimuli, one at a time, becomes peripheral as well, once the 'hatching' process is complete. Focus is thereafter mobile, no longer attached necessarily to a specific stimulus alone. The 'hatched' infant observes and relates to his own agenda. Integrational ability is a cognitive change in the organization of experience, shaped by an emotional relationship, which leads to later learning competence in an integrative learning state.