Clinical Considerations Regarding the Use of Touch in Psychotherapy

Authors

  • Diana Guest
  • Jan Parker

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.30820/0743-4804-2022-32-123

Keywords:

use of touch in psychotherapy, somatic psychotherapy, ethical issues, types of therapeutic touch

Abstract

The use of touch in psychotherapy has been a topic of discussion since Freud stopped touching his patients. Psychology in general has moved away from utilizing touch as a therapeutic intervention. However, several body-oriented clinical approaches, such as Bioenergetic Analysis, Neo-Reichian therapy, Core Energetics, Hakomi, and Somatic Experiencing, include touch as approved interventions. This article explores how touch can be used ethically in clinical practice. Types of touch and ethical considerations are discussed as well as the need for training and more research.

Author Biography

Diana Guest

Diana Guest, MFT, CBT, is a member of the IIBA faculty and is coordinating trainer for SCIBA, the New Zealand society and the first two training groups in China. She is currently on the BoT and was the president of the IIBA from 2017-2020. She leads workshops and teaches in Latin America, the USA and China. She has written several books and articles with her co-author Jan Parker. They recently published Becoming Grounded: a detailed guide for bioenergetic therapists which has also been translated into Italian. They also wrote A Guide to Becoming Grounded: for somatic therapist and individuals. All are available at Amazon.com.
123-134 36180

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How to Cite

Guest, D., & Parker, J. (2022). Clinical Considerations Regarding the Use of Touch in Psychotherapy. Bioenergetic Analysis, 32(1), 123–134. https://doi.org/10.30820/0743-4804-2022-32-123

Issue

Vol. 32 No. 1 (2022)

Section

Articles

License

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). This license allows private use and unmodified distribution, but prohibits editing and commercial use (further information can be found at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). The terms of the Creative Commons licence only apply to the original material. The reuse of material from other sources (marked with a reference) such as charts, illustrations, photos and text extracts may require further permission for use from the respective copyrights holder.