Abstract
In this paper we introduce a three replica potential, useful for examining the structure of metastable states above the static transition temperature, in the spherical p-spin model. Studying the minima of the potential we are able to find the distance between the nearest equilibrium and local equilibrium states, thus obtaining information on the dynamics of the system. Furthermore, the analysis of the potential at the dynamical transition temperature suggests that equilibrium states are not randomly distributed in the phase space.