Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Mind–Body Connection in Dance/Movement Therapy: Theory and Empirical Support

  • Published:
American Journal of Dance Therapy Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Interest from varied academic disciplines regarding the mind–body connection has increased in recent decades. This interest has resulted in a proliferation of empirical research investigating the phenomenon. This growing body of research, coming from the cognitive and behavioral neurosciences and identified under the label of embodiment research, combined with the lively conversation between embodiment researchers, are of great importance to the field of dance/movement therapy (DMT). However, in order for DMT to participate effectively in the conversation, the field first needs a clarification of its own theory regarding the mind–body connection. This article distills a sub-section of existing DMT theory into a set of grounded descriptive statements, and summarizes existing empirical data from cognitive and behavioral neurosciences that substantiate the statements. A modified grounded theory method was used. Implications for future research direction are discussed.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • American Dance Therapy Association. (n.d.). About dance/movement therapy. Retrieved May 24, 2015, from http://adta.org/About_DMT.

  • Bargh, J. A., Chen, M., & Burrows, L. (1996). Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of trait construct and stereotype activation on action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71(2), 230–244.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Barsalou, L. W. (1999). Perceptual symbol systems. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 22(4), 577–660. doi:10.1017/S0140525X99002149.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bartenieff, I., & Lewis, D. (1980). Body movement: Coping with the environment. New York: Gordon & Breach.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berger, M. R. (1999). Movement patterns in borderline and narcissistic personality disorders. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, School of Education, New York University, New York.

  • Berrol, C. F. (2000). The spectrum of research options in dance/movement therapy. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 22(1), 29–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Buccino, G., Riggio, L., Melli, G., Binkofski, F., Gallese, V., & Rizzolatti, G. (2005). Listening to action-related sentences modulates the activity of the motor system: A combined TMS and behavioral study. Cognitive Brain Research, 24(3), 355–363. doi:10.1016/j.cogbrainres.2005.02.020.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cacioppo, J. T., Priester, J. R., & Berntson, G. G. (1993). Rudimentary determinants of attitudes II: Arm flexion and extension have differential effects on attitudes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(1), 5–17.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cesario, J., Plaks, J. E., & Higgins, E. T. (2006). Automatic social behavior as motivated preparation to interact. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90(6), 893–910. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.90.6.893.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Chaiklin, S., & Schmais, C. (1993). The Chace approach to dance therapy. In S. L. Sandel, S. Chaiklin, & A. Lohn (Eds.), Foundations of dance/movement therapy: The life and work of Marian Chace (pp. 75–97). Columbia, MD: The Marian Chace Memorial Fund.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen, M., & Bargh, J. A. (1999). Consequences of automatic evaluation: Immediate behavioral predispositions to approach or avoid the stimulus. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 25(2), 215–224. doi:10.1177/0146167299025002007.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Corbin, J., & Strauss, A. (1990). Grounded theory research: Procedures, canons, and evaluative criteria. Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 19(6), 418–427.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cruz, R. F. (2009). Validity of the movement psychodiagnostic inventory: A pilot study. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 31(2), 122–135.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Damasio, A. R. (1994). Descartes’ error: Emotion, reason, and the human brain. New York: B.P. Putnam’s Sons.

    Google Scholar 

  • Daveson, B., O’Callaghan, C., & Grocke, D. (2008). Indigenous music therapy theory building through grounded theory research: The developing indigenous theory framework. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 35(4), 280–286. doi:10.1016/j.aip.2008.06.005.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Davis, M. (1997). Selections from guide to movement analysis methods. Unpublished manuscript.

  • Dell, C. (1970). Primer for movement description using effort/shape (2nd ed.). New York: Dance Notation Bureau Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Descartes, R. (1988). Selected philosophical writings (J. Cottingham, R. Stoothoff & D. Murdoch, Trans.). New York: Cambridge University Press.

  • Du Nann Winter, D. (1992). Body movement and cognitive style: Validation of Action Profiling. In S. Loman, & R. Brandt (Eds.), The body-mind connection in human movement analysis (pp. 153–203). Keene, NH: Antioch New England Graduate School.

    Google Scholar 

  • Erwin-Grabner, T., Goodill, S. W., Schelly Hill, E., & Von Neida, K. (1999). Effectiveness of dance/movement therapy on reducing test anxiety. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 21(1), 19–34. doi:10.1023/A:1022882327573.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fuchs, T. (2012). The phenomenology of body memory. In S. Koch, T. Fuchs, M. Summa, & C. Muller (Eds.), Body memory, metaphor, and movement (pp. 9–22). Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Gardner, H. (2011). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences (3rd ed.). New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Germer, C. (2005). Mindfulness: What is it? What does it matter? In C. K. Germer, R. D. Siegel, & P. R. Fulton (Eds.), Mindfulness and psychotherapy (pp. 3–27). New York: Guilford Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gesell, A. (1925). The mental growth of the pre-school child: A psychological outline of normal development from birth to the sixth year, including a system of development diagnosis. New York: The Macmillan Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goodill, S. W. (2005). Dance/movement therapy for adults with cystic fibrosis: Pilot data on mood and adherence. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, 11(1), 76–77.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goodman, L. S. (1991). Movement behavior of hyperactive children: A qualitative analysis. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 13(1), 19–31.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hackney, P. (2000). What are the principles of Bartenieff Fundamentals? Making connections: Total body integration through Bartenieff Fundamentals. New York: Gordon & Breach.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ho, R. T. H. (2005). Effects of dance movement therapy on Chinese cancer patients: A pilot study in Hong Kong. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 32(5), 337–345. doi:10.1016/j.aip.2005.04.005.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Homann, K. B. (2010). Embodied concepts of neurobiology in dance/movement therapy practice. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 32(2), 80–99. doi:10.1007/s10465-010-9099-6.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Iverson, J. M., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (1998). Why people gesture when they speak. Nature, 396(6708), 228. doi:10.1038/24300.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kahneman, D. (2013). Thinking, fast and slow. New York: Farrar Straus and Giroux.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kestenberg Amighi, J., Loman, S., Lewis, P., & Sossin, K. M. (1999). The meaning of movement: Developmental and clinical perspectives of the Kestenberg Movement Profile. New York: Brunner-Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Knapp, M. L., & Hall, J. A. (2002). Nonverbal communication in human interaction (5th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning.

  • Koch, S. C. (2006). Gender and leadership at work: Use of rhythms and movement qualities in team communication. In S. C. Koch & I. Brauninger (Eds.), Advances in dance/movement therapy: Theoretical perspectives and empirical findings (pp. 116–127). Berlin, Germany: Logos Verlag Berlin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koch, S. C. (2014). Rhythm is it: Effects of dynamic body feedback on affect, attitudes and cognition. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 537. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00537.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Koch, S. C., Glawe, S., & Holt, D. V. (2011). Up and down, front and back: Movement and meaning in the vertical and sagittal axes. Social Psychology, 42(3), 214–224. doi:10.1027/1864-9335/a000065.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Koch, S., Holland, R. W., Hengstler, M., & van Knippenberg, A. (2009). Body locomation as regulatory process: Stepping backward enhances cognitive control. Psychological Science, 20(5), 549–550.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Koch, S. C., Kunz, T., Lykou, S., & Cruz, R. (2013). Effects of dance movement therapy and dance on health-related psychological outcomes: A meta-analysis. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 41(1), 46–64. doi:10.1016/j.aip.2013.10.004.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kornblum, R., & Halsten, R. L. (2006). In-school dance/movement therapy for traumatized children. In S. L. Brooke (Ed.), Creative arts therapies manual: A guide to the history, theoretical approaches, assessment, and work with special populations of art, play, dance, music, dramas, and poetry therapies (pp. 144–155). Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kuhn, T. S. (1977). Objectivity, value judgment, and theory choice. In The essential tension: Selected studies in scientific tradition and change. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

  • Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (2008). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought. New York: Basic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lamb, W. (1965). Posture and gesture. London: G. Duckworth & Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lausberg, H. (1998). Does movement behavior have differential diagnostic potential? Discussion of a controlled study on patients with anorexia nervosa and bulimia. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 20(2), 85–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lemke, M. R., Wendorff, T., Mieth, B., Buhl, K., & Linnemann, M. (2000). Spatiotemporal gait patterns during over ground locomotion in major depression compared with healthy controls. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 34(4), 277–283. doi:10.1016/S0022-3956(00)00017-0.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Levy, F. (2005). Dance movement therapy: A healing art. Reston, VA: AAHPERD.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levy, J. A., & Duke, M. P. (2003). The use of Laban Movement Analysis in the study of personality, emotional state and movement style: An exploratory investigation of the veridicality of “body language”. Individual Differences Research, 1(1), 39–63.

    Google Scholar 

  • Meekums, B. (2005a). The detailed map. Dance movement therapy (pp. 13–36). London: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Meekums, B. (2005b). Warming up and getting started. Dance movement therapy (pp. 54–79). London: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Meier, B. P., & Robinson, M. D. (2004). Why the sunny side is up: Associations between affect and vertical position. Psychological Science, 15(4), 243–247. doi:10.1111/j.0956-7976.2004.00659.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Meier, B. P., & Robinson, M. D. (2006). Does “feeling down” mean seeing down? Depressive symptoms and vertical selective attention. Journal of Research in Personality, 40(4), 451–461. doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2005.03.001.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meier, B. P., Schnall, S., Schwarz, N., & Bargh, J. A. (2012). Embodiment in social psychology. Topics in Cognitive Science, 4(4), 705–716. doi:10.1111/j.1756-8765.2012.01212.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mertens, D. M. (2010). Research and evaluation in education and psychology: Integrating diversity with quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Michalak, J., Troje, N. J., Fischer, J., Vollmar, P., Heidenrech, T., & Schulte, D. (2009). Embodiment of sadness and depression: Gait patterns associated with dysphoric mood. Psychosomatic Medicine, 71(5), 580–587.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Miles, L. K., Betka, E., Pendry, L. F., & Macrae, C. N. (2010a). Mapping temporal constructs: Actions reveal that time is a place. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63(11), 2113.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miles, L. K., Nind, L. K., & Macrae, C. N. (2010b). Moving through time. Psychological Science, 21(2), 222–223. doi:10.1177/0956797609359333.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. (2015, February). Framework for developing and testing mind body interventions. National Institutes of Health, U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. Retrieved from https://nccih.nih.gov/grants/mindbody/framework.

  • Newman, B. M., & Newman, P. R. (2012). Major theories for understanding human development. Development through life: A psychosocial approach (pp. 20–59). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

    Google Scholar 

  • Niedenthal, P. M., Barsalou, L. W., Winkielman, P., Krauth-Gruber, S., & Ric, F. (2005). Embodiment in attitudes, social perception, and emotion. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 9(3), 184–211. doi:10.1207/s15327957pspr0903_1.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • O’Rourke, M. (2014, November). Doctors tell all—And it’s bad. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/.

  • Pallaro, P. (1996). Self and body self: Dance/movement therapy and the development of object relations. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 23(2), 113–119.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pallaro, P. (2006). Somatic countertransference: The therapist in relationship. In Authentic movement: Moving the body, moving the self, being moved (pp. 176–193). London: Jessica Kingsley

  • Perry, B., & Szalavitz, M. (2006). The boy who was raised as a dog. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pert, C. P. (1997). Molecules of emotion: Why you feel the way you feel. New York: Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Piaget, J. (1962). The stages of the intellectual development of the child. Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, 26(3), 120–128.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pulvermüller, F. (2005). Brain mechanisms linking language and action. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 6(7), 576–582. doi:10.1038/nrn1706.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pulvermüller, F. (2013). How neurons make meaning: Brain mechanisms for embodied and abstract-symbolic semantics. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 17(9), 458–470. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2013.06.004.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pulvermüller, F., Hauk, O., Nikulin, V. V., & Ilmoniemi, R. J. (2005). Functional links between motor and language systems. European Journal of Neuroscience, 21, 793–797. doi:10.1111/j.1460-95.68.2005.03900.x.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pylvanainen, P. (2003). Body image: A tripartite model for use in dance/movement therapy. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 25(1), 39–55.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schmais, C. (1974). Dance therapy in perspective. In K. Mason (Ed.), Focus on dance vii (pp. 7–12). Reston, VA: AAHPERD.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schmais, C. (1985). Healing processes in group dance therapy. American Journal of Dance Therapy, 8(1), 17–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schubert, T. W. (2004). The power in your hand: Gender differences in bodily feedback from making a fist. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 30(6), 757–769. doi:10.1177/0146167204263780.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Schubert, T. W. (2005). Your highness: Vertical positions as perceptual symbols of power. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89(1), 1–21. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.89.1.1.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Stepper, S., & Strack, F. (1993). Proprioceptive determinants of emotional and nonemotional feelings. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64(2), 211–220.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Strack, F., Martin, L. L., & Stepper, S. (1988). Inhibiting and facilitating conditions of the human smile: A nonobtrusive test of the facial feedback hypothesis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(5), 768–777.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tagore, R. (n.d.). BrainyQuote.com. Retrieved August 8, 2016, from BrainyQuote.com: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/rabindrana380542.html.

  • van der Kolk, B. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. New York: Penguin Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Verghese, J., Lipton, R. B., Katz, M. J., Hall, C. B., Derby, C. A., Kuslansky, G., et al. (2003). Leisure activities and the risk of dementia in the elderly. The New England Journal of Medicine, 348(25), 2508–2516. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa022252.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wells, G. L., & Petty, R. E. (1980). The effects of overt head movements on persuasion: Compatibility and incompatibility of responses. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 1(3), 219–230.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgment

I wish to thank Dr. Elizabeth Templeton, Dr. Sherry Goodill, and Dr. Sabine Koch for their valuable feedback, advice, and encouragement.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Philadelphia, PA, 19146, USA

    Jessica Acolin

Authors
  1. Jessica Acolin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jessica Acolin.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Acolin, J. The Mind–Body Connection in Dance/Movement Therapy: Theory and Empirical Support. Am J Dance Ther 38, 311–333 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10465-016-9222-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10465-016-9222-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation