Nonverbal Attunement Research Articles

Smile Back at Me, But Only Once: Social Norms of Appropriate Nonverbal Intensity and Reciprocity Apply to Emoji Use

In computer-mediated communication, small graphical icons (emojis) can be used to compensate for the lack of nonverbal cues such as facial expressions or hand gestures. Accordingly, literature suggests that the use of emojis may also be subject to social norms—similar to nonverbal behavior in face-to-face interactions. However, actual empirical investigations into this assumption remain lacking. To remedy this research gap, I explored whether traditional norms of appropriate emotional intensity and reciprocity also apply to emoji usage. A first online experiment (N = 188) revealed that excessive emoji use in a first-contact scenario leads to diminished interpersonal outcomes, corresponding to the drawbacks of overly intense nonverbal displays in natural interactions. Proceeding to a different communicative stage, Experiment 2 (N = 242) explored nonverbal reciprocity with acquainted interaction partners. Inviting participants to reply to fictitious text messages (at varying levels of interpersonal intimacy), it was observed that stimulus messages containing more emojis also evoke stronger emoji use in return—indicating that principles of nonverbal attunement are in full effect during text-based online interactions.

Alliance Formations in Couple Therapy: A Multimodal and Multimethod Study

The authors sought to study underlying processes of alliance formation, a multimethod and multimodal research procedure was developed and applied to a 6-minute episode from one couple therapy case. The participants were a couple and two male cotherapists. The interaction was analyzed at the levels of the conversational exchange, bodily postures, and movements, and autonomic nervous system responses. Data were also obtained from stimulated recall interviews and an alliance measure. When there were clear markers of alliance in a dyad’s conversation, markers of nonverbal synchrony (such as posture or movement mirroring, or sympathetic nervous system synchrony) were also observed in one or several modalities. Moreover, markers of nonverbal synchrony were often observed, not only between those who participated actively on the conversational level but also between listeners. These markers of nonverbal alliance served important balancing functions by providing support and maintaining the connection to a client. Even more than previously assumed, implicit nonverbal attunement between clients and therapists may be relevant in the formation of the therapeutic alliance.

The experience of attunement and misattunement in dance movement therapy workshops

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.

Clinical Mutual Attunement and the Development of Therapeutic Process: A Preliminary Study

Despite the identification of many factors that play a central role in the development of the psychotherapy process, there is still a lack of evidence about the basic relational mechanisms that pave the way to its working. In this pilot study, we focus on nonverbal microprocessual attunement as the basic mechanism grounding the displacing of discrete factors in shaping the clinical process. Two single sessions of two short-term psychodynamic treatments, selected respectively from a good- and a poor-outcome treatment, have been coded in terms of patient and therapist speech rate, coordination in ruptures, resolution of the therapeutic alliance, and patient's displayed thinking processes. Two dynamic structural equation models focusing on clinical attunement as a factor able to activate the interplay of the assessed clinical dimensions have been theoretically designed and tested in both cases. The driven theoretical structural equation models fit the data, suggesting a different role of nonverbal attunement as a moderating factor. The obtained results are consistent with the hypothesis claiming that a good-outcome psychotherapy session is characterized by a mechanism of clinical attunement that enforces the therapist–patient relationship and promotes the integration of formal thinking processes that affect emotional and cognitive domains.

MATERNAL DEPRESSION AND NONVERBAL ATTUNEMENT

Nonverbal attunement is when mother attunes with emotional state of the child by changing her nonverbal behaviour (posture, facial expressions, movement rhythm, speed, etc.) instead of using verbal means of expression such as naming child's activity, verbal reflection or interpretation. Mother's difficulty to attune with a child is associated with high rates of the psychopathology in children (Allen, Fonagy, & Baterman, 2008). The research aimed to determine whether and what are the correlations between mother’s depression symptoms and to her ability nonverbally attune to her child. 30 mothers and their children participated in this part of the research by performed creative tasks. Maternal nonverbal attunement with a child was determined using the Nonverbal Attunement Scale (Vende & Čukurs, 2011). Mothers also filled in the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI II Beck Depression Inventory; Beck, Steer, & Brown, 1996). Research findings indicate that maternal depression symptoms are not correlated to maternal nonverbal attunement with a child, and that is inconsistent with existing research. There was additionally examined child's ability to attune nonverbally to the mother in relation with maternal depression symptoms. These results show that maternal depression symptoms are negatively correlated to child's ability to mirror the mother nonverbally.

“Attuning to the unspoken: The relationship between therapist nonverbal attunement and attachment security in adult psychotherapy”: Correction to Håvås, Svartberg, and Ulvenes (2015).

“Attuning to the unspoken: The relationship between therapist nonverbal attunement and attachment security in adult psychotherapy”: Correction to Håvås, Svartberg, and Ulvenes (2015).

Attuning to the unspoken: The relationship between therapist nonverbal attunement and attachment security in adult psychotherapy.

Attuning to the unspoken: The relationship between therapist nonverbal attunement and attachment security in adult psychotherapy.

Kinaesthetic intersubjectivity: A dance informed contribution to self-other relatedness and shared experience in non-verbal psychotherapy with an example from autism

Early interpersonal experiences have been the focus of philosophy and developmental psychology for decades. Concepts of self and self-other relatedness seem to have an onset in early interaction patterns during dyadic relating. Phenomenologists consider the embodied, that is the intercorporeal dialogue, as the basis for self-other relating. Developmental psychologists have shown that the responsiveness a child is met with during early phases of life is a very subtle process. Kinaesthetic intersubjectivity is introduced as a perspective on dyadic relating. Embodied attitude during dance duets is taken as an example of active nonverbal attunement between interaction partners. Shared movement situations will serve as an example of how a sense of intersubjectivity and self-other differentiation can be perceived through movement structures. Shared movement intervention could offer a new perspective for psychotherapeutic intervention in disorders with a disturbed self, like autism and need researching.

Development of “Nonverbal Attunement Scale” for assessment of mother–child interaction

Development of “Nonverbal Attunement Scale” for assessment of mother–child interaction

The use of metaphors in dance movement therapy

This text focuses on the specific structure of metaphors in terms of movement processes. The processing of symbolic movement material through structures derived from dance as an art form is investigated. Metaphors that support nonverbal attunement between patient and therapist, and how the use of metaphors and creative processes help establish the inter-subjective relation in dance movement therapy are described.

Lack of coordination of nonverbal behaviour between patients and interviewers as a potential risk factor to depression recurrence: vulnerability accumulation in depression

Background: Coordination of nonverbal behaviour during interactions is a prerequisite for satisfactory relationships. Lack of coordination may form a risk factor for depression. The ‘vulnerability-accumulation hypothesis’ assumes that vulnerability to recurrence of depression will increase with increasing experience of depressive episodes. Therefore it is expected that interviewers and patients remitted from a recurrent episode of depression would reach less coordination during a clinical interview compared to interviewers and patients remitted from a first lifetime episode. Moreover, we assumed that prior severity of depression modifies this reciprocal coordination process. Methods: During discharge interviews, interviewers were videotaped in interaction with remitted patients with unipolar major depression recurrent depression (REC); n=28; first episode (SEP); n=22. Durations and frequencies of nonverbal involvement behaviour was registered during the first 15 min. Involvement of the patients consisted of gesticulating, looking at the interviewer, and general head movements; yes - nodding and hm, hm, yes, yes reflected involvement of the interviewer. Coordination between patients and interviewers was analyzed per 3-min epochs and defined as ‘attunement’: the absolute difference between patients’ and interviewers’ involvement. Averaged attunement, its time course and variability (presumably reflecting control of the attunement process) were assessed. Results: The time course of nonverbal attunement differed between the REC and SEP condition. A larger variability of attunement was found in patients remitted from a relatively severely depressed episode, compared to patients remitted from a severe first life time episode. No other significant differences were found. Conclusions: Partial support was found for the notion that nonverbal vulnerability accumulates in depression and that the severity of prior depression modifies this process.

Nonverbal attunement between depressed patients and an interviewer predicts subsequent improvement

Depressed patients' support-seeking behaviour and the responses to this behaviour by others (support-giving) are presumed to play a causal role in depression. In interactions between normals, attuning nonverbal behaviour (i.e., equalizing levels of specific behavioural activities) is important for satisfaction of the participants with the interaction. We investigated the attunement of nonverbal support-seeking and support-giving of 31 depressed patients and 1 interviewer during a 20-min admission interview. We defined attunement as the absolute difference between patients' and interviewers' nonverbal behaviour. It was found that the more attunement increased over the interview, the more favourable the subsequent course of depression was. The findings emphasize the potential role of interpersonal processes in depression.