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Home / Journal of Loss and Trauma, Volume 24, Numbers 5-6

Embodied Self in Trauma and Self-Harm: A Pilot Study of Effects of Flamenco Therapy on Traumatized Inpatients

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Flamenco, the Spanish dance, is about expressing oneself with clarity, beauty, strength, pride, and self-confidence. Trauma survivors have often lost the ability to express themselves authentically, because they feel disconnected from themselves, or from life, often associate strength with violence, and can be flooded by strong emotions when moving. Due to the suitability of Flamenco to produce sensations of strength, pride, and well-being via body feedback, clinical institutions are starting to use Flamenco in the context of dance, music, or body psychotherapy for trauma survivors. In an experimental pilot study, N = 32 traumatized inpatients (n = 16 patients in the experimental group assessed before and after receiving a single Flamenco Therapy intervention, and  n = 16 patients in the control group receiving treatment as usual) were tested for change on the following outcomes: well-being, body self-efficacy, interpersonal resonance, plus experienced health, fitness, and pain levels. Results suggest a significant improvement of well-being, improvement of experienced health level, and improvement of experienced physical pain after Flamenco therapy in the experimental group compared to the control group, and a marginal effect for improvement of interpersonal resonance (p < .10 on both measures). Given the fact that the small sample already provided considerable suggestive effects, results are encouraging, but because of the underpowered sample needs further testing. Findings and limitations are discussed with respect to active factors of dance movement therapy.

Keywords: Flamenco therapy; PTSD; body self-efficacy; borderline personality disorder; experienced health; interpersonal resonance; self-harm; trauma survivors; well-being

Document Type: Research Article

Affiliations: 1: Department of Creative Arts Therapies and Therapy Sciences, Alanus University Alfter, Alfter, Germany; 2: Department of Psychiatry, SRH Hospitals Karlsbad-Langensteinbach, Karlsbad-Langensteinbach, Germany; 3: Department of Psychiatry, Psychosocial Center, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

Publication date: 18 August 2019

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