The experience of attunement and misattunement in dance movement therapy workshops

Abstract

Moments of attunement and misattunement were explored in a dance movement therapy workshops. The guiding question was; "how do participants experience moments of attunement and misattunement in dance movement therapy workshops?" The study employed a quasi-experimental design, with phenomenological inquiry, including a two part analysis: Laban Movement Analysis and descriptive grounded theory using coding. Four students of expressive arts therapies attended four experimental dance movement therapy workshops, emphasising the process of mutual attunement. All workshops were video recorded. Based on video movement analysis, key moments of nonverbal attunement and misattunement were selected, and then analyzed within group interviews with participants. The results of the study show that successful attunement in dance movement therapy draws the client's attention to the present moment; it encourages individual spontaneity, playfulness, and creativity; promotes embodiment, and thus the integration of mind and body. Successful attunement to the other leads to an intersubjective interchange, where two people co-create an intersubjective experience. Successful attunement to the group leads to the experience of oneness with the group. Moments of misattunement trigger unpleasant feelings, and result in a lack of spontaneity, feelings of exclusion, and hinder contact. The limitations of the results should be considered, as the study was done on a small number of participants and in nonclinical experimental setting. Researchers propose a larger study with clinical populations to further investigate the phenomenon of attunement and misattunement in dance movement therapy.

An Investigation into Art Therapy Aided Health and Well-Being Research: A 75-Year Bibliometric Analysis

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A Systematic Review of the Contribution of Dance Movement Psychotherapy Towards the Well-Being of Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders

“…Among those eleven theories, the intersubjectivity theory (Stern, 2005 ; Trevarthen, 2005 ; Meltzoff and Brooks, 2007 ) used for describing relations between people, has influenced the development of three DMP intervention models called Shared Movement Approach (SMA) by Samaritter ( 2015 ); Creative Movement Play approach by Chiang et al ( 2016 ) and See-Saw by Aithal ( 2020 ). Intersubjectivity theory was also used to explain a core concept used in DMP called Kinaesthetic empathy (Jerak et al, 2018 ). Further, the same theory has encouraged Houghton and Beebe ( 2016 ) to look more deeply at disruption and repair within a dyadic system.…”

“…In the past, the term attunement has been described as a component of mirroring that often goes beyond empathy and can be seen as a product of mirroring (Erskine and Trautmann, 1997 ; Trevarthen and Fresquez, 2015 ). The process of attunement is reported to have two levels (Jerak et al, 2018 ). At first, the moving partners are fully aware of the other person's sensations, needs, or feelings and the next step is the communication of that awareness (Jerak et al, 2018 ).…”

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Dansen met complexiteit: improvisatie als verbindende vaardigheid in governance processen

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