Emotorics

Domain IV · Body-oriented psychotherapy · Yona Shahar-Levy · 1996 · Israel

What it is

Emotorics is a developmental, psychoanalytic and psychomotor model for observing, analysing and interpreting "emotive-motor behaviour". It treats the motor system as the physical executor of the self's drives, emotions, perception and relationships, seen developmentally. It has three levels: a…

Format

• Format. Movement is filmed, typically before and after an intervention; in the main published study, two fixed cameras that did not move, coding only segments where most of the body was visible. The film is cut into smaller movement phrases. Two trained raters code each phrase, and inter-rater…
• Not given in the published sources on the method (the Routledge contents, the Benjamins chapter page, an Israeli DMT history article and a doctoral thesis that used the method): a set number of sessions, treatment phases with entry and exit criteria, or a treatment manual. The only documented…

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• What it is. Emotorics is a developmental, psychoanalytic and psychomotor model for observing, analysing and interpreting "emotive-motor behaviour". It treats the motor system as the physical executor of the self's drives, emotions, perception and relationships, seen developmentally. It has three levels: a theoretical level; a "core-grammar" of emotive movement built on specific psychomotor diagnostic indexes; and a…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve intense or unusual breathing? Have you been told about the medical conditions for which that is not advised?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Does it use a device, heat, cold, water or a physical procedure? Has a medical professional checked that it is safe for you?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• freezes at the same point in the transition. Explore what feeling sits there.
• over-interpretation. Keep any meaning the client does not recognise provisional.
• discomfort at being copied. Reduce the mirroring to subtle matching of qualities.
• phrases that are too long and blur transitions. Transitions are coded separately (4.6).
• joints where the movement stops. Shahar-Levy treats joints as passing or stopping motor impulses.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.