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Guide IV-085

Body-ego technique

Trudi Schoop1963California, USA
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[source: …] where a claim comes from[uncertain] not confirmed in a primary source[synthesis] the writer's reconstruction

1. Introduction

Version followed: none could be verified. Placeholder, not a usable treatment guide. Sources verify the method's origin and its two primary papers (see below), but no source describes the procedure itself, so no phases, principles or techniques are given here.

What can be confirmed. Body-ego technique was a movement-based approach to hospitalised patients with schizophrenia developed by the Swiss dancer and dance-therapy pioneer Trudi Schoop (1904–1999) and colleagues. Schoop worked at Camarillo State Mental Hospital, California, where UCLA neuropsychiatrists had recommended her as a therapist, and "developed what she called body-ego technique" [source: Wikipedia, Trudi Schoop; Pallaro & Fischlein-Rupp 2002]. Two papers report the work: May, Wexler, Salkin & Schoop (1963), "Non-verbal techniques in the re-establishment of body image and self identity", Psychiatric Research Reports 16, 68–82; and Goertzel, May, Salkin & Schoop (1965), "Body-ego technique: an approach to the schizophrenic patient", Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 141(1), 53–60 [source: reference list of Maurer-Groeli 1976; Wikipedia, Trudi Schoop]. The co-author P. R. May is presumably Philip R. A. May, but no source used gives his first name, and none states the authors' affiliations, so that the 1963–1965 work itself was carried out at Camarillo is likely but not confirmed [uncertain]. Jeri Salkin later wrote Body Ego Technique: An Educational and Therapeutic Approach to Body Image and Self Identity (American Lectures Series) [source: Goodreads work record]; its publisher (Charles C Thomas) and year (about 1973) are not confirmed [uncertain].

Unverified leads.

  • Scandinavian psychiatric physiotherapy. Two possibly related records:
    • Gertrud Roxendal's thesis, Body awareness therapy and the body awareness scale: treatment and evaluation in psychiatric physiotherapy (Göteborg, 1985; GUPEA handle 2077/13853);
    • PubMed record PMID 21845555. It is not known whether or how either one describes the body ego technique, or how it relates to Basic Body Awareness Therapy (BBAT) [uncertain].
  • German-language follow-up. Maurer-Groeli (1976), "Körperzentrierte Gruppenpsychotherapie bei akut schizophren Erkrankten" (body-centred group psychotherapy with acute schizophrenia patients), Archiv für Psychiatrie und Nervenkrankheiten 221, 259–271, cites both body-ego papers. Whether it describes or adapts the technique is not known [uncertain].

Core idea of how change happens. A one-line secondary summary says the technique "used movement to help draw patients out of isolation" [source: Wikipedia, Trudi Schoop, citing Goertzel et al. 1965]. The 1963 title and Salkin's subtitle add that it aimed to re-establish body image and self-identity. How this was meant to work, and what was done in sessions, is not sourced [uncertain].

2. Framework

No source gives any of the following for the body ego technique [uncertain]:

  • phases or stages;
  • session count, length or frequency;
  • individual or group format;
  • the setting;
  • criteria for moving between phases.

Further sources. Useful: Wikipedia's Trudi Schoop article (Camarillo, the name of the method, the 1965 paper); the Springer page for Maurer-Groeli 1976 (full citations of the 1963 and 1965 papers); Pallaro & Fischlein-Rupp 2002 (Schoop at Camarillo Hospital). No procedure is given in: the PMC paper on manualised movement therapy for negative symptoms (Martin et al. 2016; based on the Röhricht manual, no link to body-ego technique); a Texas Woman's University rhythmic-movement thesis record; the Dance Therapy Association of Australia page on dance-movement in a psychiatric setting; two Self & Society articles (AHP). Not drawn on: PubMed 21845555, an MSU dissertation, a PMC literature review of dance/movement therapy in schizophrenia.

3. Guiding principles

No principles of the body ego technique could be sourced [uncertain]. Do not infer them from BBAT, dance movement therapy or other body psychotherapies and attribute them to Salkin.

To practise in this area, use a documented, related method with a published manual or training route instead [synthesis]:

  • Basic Body Awareness Therapy (Roxendal; Gyllensten and colleagues) in psychiatric physiotherapy;
  • the manualised group body psychotherapy used for negative symptoms of schizophrenia in the NESS trial [source: NIHR NESS report; Qigong Institute abstract of Gyllensten et al. 2019].

4. Intervention inventory

No interventions, exercises or session contents of the body ego technique could be verified [uncertain]. None are listed here, so that no techniques are invented or wrongly attributed.

Primary texts that would document the procedure:

  • Salkin's book, through a library copy, a publisher preview or an archive.org lending copy;
  • Roxendal's 1985 thesis, through the GUPEA full text or a library copy;
  • the PMID 21845555 article, through its DOI landing page or the journal site.

The most direct primary texts, not drawn on: Goertzel, May, Salkin & Schoop (1965), Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 141, 53–60; and May, Wexler, Salkin & Schoop (1963), Psychiatric Research Reports 16, 68–82 (American Psychiatric Association). Trudi Schoop's own book on her psychiatric dance work is another possible route [uncertain].

5. Handling problems

No method-specific guidance is sourced [uncertain].

General cautions for any movement or body-image work with people with psychosis [synthesis]:

  • Make sure the patient has a stable treatment frame and psychiatric oversight.
  • Start with simple, structured, grounding activities.
  • Watch for increased disorganisation, dissociation or paranoid misreading of the therapist's movements or closeness.
  • Avoid touch unless you have specific training, explicit consent, a no-touch alternative and an agreed stop signal.
  • Check what your licence and jurisdiction allow.
  • Get supervision from someone trained in the related method you are using.

Sources

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