PACT · Atlas

1. Introduction

Version followed: PACT (A Psychobiological Approach to Couple Therapy) as Stan Tatkin and the PACT Institute teach it in 2024–2026. No treatment manual is published. Sources used: the Institute's own "What is PACT", Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 and certification pages (domains, training structure, the first-session / middle-sessions / end-session organisation, the names of the core assessments and interventions, certification rules); Institute blog posts on how PACT sessions work (session length, video, first-session history), on staging, on the clinical pause and on the compassionate request; Tatkin's Erickson Foundation workshop abstracts (including the containers, deal-breaker, bottom-up-techniques and informal-trance workshops); his psychotherapy.net interview; and the table of contents of Solomon and Tatkin's Love and War in Intimate Relationships (Norton, 2011), the clinician book. Couple-facing practices come from Wired for Love (chapter titles only). Limits: the Institute's In-Service Training Packet was not used, and no published source gives step-by-step procedures for most named interventions, so most Steps below remain the writer's operationalisation [synthesis]. [source: PACT Institute "What is PACT"; PACT Institute Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3 course pages; PACT Institute certification page; PACT Institute blog; Erickson catalogue; psychotherapy.net interview; ECU library record of Love and War] [uncertain: no session-by-session protocol is published]

PACT is a conjoint couple therapy that Tatkin calls non-linear and poly-theoretical. It draws on five domains: attachment, arousal regulation, neurobiological development, therapeutic enactment and therapeutic narrative. Its aim is a secure-functioning relationship. The Institute defines that as a performance standard, not a feeling: partners regulate each other, collaborate, protect each other and repair quickly under stress, whatever each partner's attachment history. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; PACT Institute blog; Erickson cc16k03, cc19-11]

Theory of change:

Much relational behaviour runs on fast, subcortical, procedural processes that partners cannot report accurately.
So change has to happen in the state where the problem occurs. The therapist stages real interactions in long, video-recorded sessions and corrects them as they happen, so that new procedural learning forms.
Insight follows the experience: "experience before interpretation" (Tatkin).
Partners take over each other's regulation as a two-person system. The therapist does not regulate them.
They also agree to principles (a "couple bubble") that put the relationship's safety first.

[source: psychotherapy.net interview; GoodTherapy PACT profile]

2. Framework

The Institute's Level 2 training organises PACT treatment into three parts: the first session, the middle sessions and the end session, each with its own "overarching principles", plus creating a treatment plan. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] The page names these parts and their skills but does not give their contents step by step. Below, Stage A corresponds to the first session, Stages B–C to the middle sessions and Stage D to the end session. The split of the middle sessions into B and C, and the criteria for moving between stages, are my own synthesis. [synthesis] [uncertain]

Format.

Both partners attend every session.
Sessions are long: the Institute says they are typically two to three hours. For very high distress it describes shorter sessions, closer to an hour, two to three times a week instead of once. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"] Tatkin elsewhere describes intakes of about three hours and sessions of up to four or more. [source: Erickson cc19-11; psychotherapy.net interview]
His rationale is that time pressure makes the therapist err. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Video recording is optional, but many PACT therapists ask to record so the couple's interaction can be analysed frame by frame. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"]
Partners sit on rolling (wheeled) chairs in an open area so the therapist can move them and see their whole bodies. The Institute requires certification and Level 3 candidates to confirm their office has rolling chairs and video capability. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; PACT Institute certification page; PACT Institute Level 3 course page]
Total length: the Institute says only that treatment is often shorter than other couple therapies. A secondary source gives 10–20 hours of contact. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"; GoodTherapy]

[uncertain: the Institute gives no official figure for the number of sessions or total hours; its "What is PACT" page says only that PACT usually needs fewer sessions than other couple models and that sessions often run longer than 50 minutes, sometimes 3–6 hours] [source: PACT Institute "What is PACT"]

Stage A: first session (intake and assessment; one extended session, about 3 h). [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; Erickson cc19-11]

Goals: get rapid, "forensic" data on the system, not the presenting content. [source: Erickson cc19-11]
History intake: how the couple met, why they chose each other, and each partner's parents and childhood. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"]
Named first-session skills: forming a therapeutic alliance, genograms, and GUSS ("get, use, synthesis, and summarize") (see 4.38–4.39). Spotting couple acting-out behaviour is also a first-session objective. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Assess each partner's attachment organisation, from the partner interview and from somatic markers (4.2). [source: Erickson cc19-11; Love and War table of contents]
Separate psychological defences from neurological or developmental deficits, such as alexithymia, affect blindness and poor theory of mind. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing; Love and War table of contents, ch. "Social/emotional skills and deficits"]
See how the couple handles stress in front of you, rather than relying on what they report. Screen for hidden agendas, betrayal and acting out. [source: Erickson cc19-11; psychotherapy.net interview]

[source: Erickson cc19-11, PACT tag listing; psychotherapy.net interview]

Stage B: orientation to secure functioning. Name secure functioning as the shared goal. Give psychobiological education so that reactions become automatic responses both partners can work with, rather than character faults. Get explicit agreement on mutual protection and on putting the couple first. [source: Erickson cc23 title "Orient couples to secure functioning" (title only); GoodTherapy; psychotherapy.net interview] [uncertain]

Stage C: experiential and staging work (the bulk of the middle sessions, 2–3 h each). [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"]

Stage interactions and use positioning, proximity, gaze and movement (4.11, 4.14, 4.40).
Organise each piece of work as a "container": an exercise that puts the couple under stress, with a set task, timing and roles the therapist casts, so you can test a hypothesis and measure progress (4.37). [source: Erickson cc22-06]
Interrupt and correct in real time, and coach partners to read and soothe each other. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"; psychotherapy.net interview]
Use the named middle-session interventions (beckoning, declarations of commitment, bending metal, collaborative narratives, corralling questions, posing and staging, the 5-minute argument, change your partner's face, playing catch, and the others in 4.40–4.48), and work with deal breakers, betrayal and projective identification. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page]

[source: Erickson cc16k03, cc19-11; psychotherapy.net interview]

Stage D: consolidation and the end session. Build shared rituals and collaborative solutions, and the governing agreements of the couple bubble: morning and bedtime routines, reunions, being each other's go-to person, managing third parties, and fighting well. [source: Erickson cc19-11; Wired for Love table of contents] The Level 2 training has separate "principles" and skills for the end session and for creating a treatment plan, but the page does not describe them. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] [uncertain: content of the end session not found] The Institute's stated aim is change the couple can repeat on their own outside therapy. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"]

Criteria for moving on [synthesis, built on the Institute's guiding question]. The Institute's working question at any point is whether this couple can function securely in this moment. If not, ask which element failed: regulation, leadership, mutual protection or shared purpose. [source: PACT Institute blog]

Move from A to B once you have a working hypothesis about each partner's attachment organisation and deficits, and about any hidden agenda.
Move from B to C once both partners have committed out loud to secure functioning as the standard. Where one partner wants out, first reach clarity (see "Bending metal" and "Pressure techniques").
Move from C to D once partners notice and repair their own dysregulation in session, with the therapist doing less. You should see quicker repair, more mutually amplified positive moments, and partners reading each other's faces without prompting.
For betrayal, Tatkin's outline expects healing to take about a year. [source: Erickson cc19-11]

Who it suits. It suits couples who treat the relationship as their primary attachment. A secondary profile says it is less suited to consensually non-monogamous arrangements. For major psychiatric illness, severe neurological deficit or suicidality, it advises broader specialist input. [source: GoodTherapy] [uncertain: secondary source]

Training and certification.

Level 1: the foundations course, offered online in modules. Its learning objectives cover the three PACT domains (arousal regulation, attachment, developmental neuroscience), visual and auditory signs of hypo- and hyper-arousal, arousal-regulation and attachment assessment and interventions, top-down versus bottom-up interventions, the islands, anchors and waves model, the basic PACT interviewing process, the therapeutic frame, therapist self-regulation and use of video. [source: PACT Institute Level 1 home-study page] A secondary source gives 40 CE hours. [source: GoodTherapy] [uncertain]
Level 2: three two-day live online blocks taught by Tatkin (30 hours, 30 CE). Prerequisite: Level 1 completed since 2013. Open to licensed and pre-licensed MFTs, counsellors, social workers, psychologists and psychiatrists (pre-licensed only in the final graduate year, under supervision, with supervisor approval). Coaches are not eligible. Cameras on, with demonstrations, role plays and group processing. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Level 3: four two-day online blocks with Tatkin and Hans Stahlschmidt (40 CE), mostly live skills workshopping, capped at 20. Prerequisites: full licence, at least 3 years using PACT, at least 30 couples treated with PACT, Level 2 within the last two years (or Institute professional development), rolling chairs, video capability and current malpractice insurance. Completion confers the designation "PACT Level 3 clinician/therapist". [source: PACT Institute Level 3 course page]
Certification: Levels 1–3 completed, full licensure, at least 3 years and 30 couples treated with PACT, Level 3 within the last two years; individual mentoring and case presentations with Tatkin and Stahlschmidt, training on DEI and digital communication, a two-day in-person meeting in Southern California and a final Zoom meeting. It confers the title "PACT Certified Therapist" and lasts two years, then must be renewed. [source: PACT Institute certification page]
PACT is not a licensed programme in the MST sense, and there is no fidelity rating of sessions. The Institute controls its designations through these training levels. [source: PACT Institute certification page; PACT Institute Level 3 course page]

[source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; PACT Institute Level 3 course page; PACT Institute certification page]

3. Guiding principles

Secure functioning is the goal, and it is principle-based, not personality-based. In practice, you hold both partners to agreed standards of fairness, sensitivity and mutual protection whatever their attachment style. You don't wait for them to feel secure. [source: Erickson cc16k03; PACT Institute blog]
Two-person psychological system. Each partner keeps regulating or dysregulating the other. In practice, you treat the dyad as the unit and challenge "one-person" solutions such as self-soothing alone or ignoring the partner. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; PACT Institute blog]
Partners are in each other's care. In practice, you coach partners to read and soothe each other and refuse to become the main regulator or the go-between. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Experience before interpretation (bottom-up). In practice, you stage an interaction first and make sense of it afterwards. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson cc12-05 title]
Proof over report. Tatkin says "one person is not a reliable reporter of the relationship." In practice, you ask to see it happen in the room rather than accepting either account. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Process, not content. In practice, you track micro-expressions, micro-movements, voice and approach and withdrawal, rather than the topic of the fight. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; GoodTherapy]
Psychobiology is a means, not an end. In practice, you use arousal and threat language to explain why secure functioning is hard, then return to what the partners must do. [source: PACT Institute blog]
Deficits differ from defences. In practice, you check whether a partner can't read faces, name feelings or take the other's mind, and if so teach and scaffold rather than confront. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2012 workshop)]
"Can't comply" differs from "won't comply". In practice, you meet dysregulation with regulation and slowing down, and meet bad faith or acting out with direct challenge. [source: PACT Institute blog]
Fairness and mutuality. Tatkin bases this on a Rawlsian idea of a fair social contract. In practice, decisions must be good for both partners. Neither partner's needs or limits automatically win. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; GoodTherapy]
Couple bubble: the dyad comes first. In practice, you treat children, work, in-laws, substances and other people as "thirds" to be managed from inside a shared, protective agreement. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Wired for Love table of contents]
Repair quickly, and amplify positives. In practice, you get distress relieved within the session, "relieved quickly, not dismissed" (Tatkin), and build many shared positive moments. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Insight is a starting point, and dialogue is a tool, not a guarantee. In practice, you support dialogue with regulation, posture, proximity, gaze and timing, and require action that serves the relationship even when emotion argues against it. [source: PACT Institute blog]
The therapist is active, evocative, at times provocative and strategic. In practice, you take the lead, test what partners are made of, and use surprise and playful "tricky" moves in the service of clarity. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
The therapist regulates themselves first. In practice, you track your own arousal, because a dysregulated therapist makes errors. Long sessions protect you against time pressure. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
The therapist is not the arbiter of who stays together. In practice, you move the couple towards security, and towards clarity, until they choose. A strong wish that they split is your countertransference to examine. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Integrate other models rather than compete with them. In practice, you can combine PACT with Gottman, EFT, Imago, IFS or RLT procedures within the secure-functioning frame. [source: PACT Institute blog]
An individual therapist is an adjunct to the relationship. In practice, when you see one partner of a primary couple, you aim to bring the other partner in. If they won't come, you don't compete with the relationship. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

4. Intervention inventory

Technique names below come from Tatkin's Erickson workshop outlines, the Institute's Level 1 and Level 2 learning objectives and its blog. The Institute's blog gives steps for staging (4.11), the clinical pause and the compassionate request (4.35); no source gives a full step-by-step protocol for the rest. Other steps are the writer's operationalisation of each named aim and are tagged [synthesis] unless a source gives the step. Subsection E (4.37–4.49) covers further Level 2 items. Where a source gives only a name, the entry says so; do not improvise a procedure under that name. All example language is illustrative. [source: PACT Institute Level 1 and Level 2 course pages; PACT Institute blog; Erickson cc19-11, cc12-05, cc22-06, PACT tag listing; psychotherapy.net interview]

A. Setting and assessment

4.1 Extended intake and "forensic" data gathering

Purpose: in about three hours, assess the system rather than the complaint: attachment organisation, deficits versus defences, stress handling, hidden agendas, betrayals. Use this at the first session. [source: Erickson cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis on source aims]:
1. Set up the staging area: two wheeled chairs, a camera, open floor, and your own chair able to move.
2. Get consent to video recording and explain why: you are going to watch how they work together, not just listen to what they say.
3. Take a brief history of the relationship (how they met, commitment points, crises), watching the listening partner as much as the speaker (4.4).
4. Ask each partner relationship-history and attachment-history questions (4.2).
5. Prompt at least one live disagreement and watch how it is regulated (4.11).
6. Ask directly about affairs, leaving and secrets (4.10, 4.17).
7. End with a provisional formulation spoken "down the middle" (4.5).
Example language (illustrative): "I'm less interested today in who's right than in how the two of you handle each other under stress. So I'll ask you to show me, not just tell me."
Watch for: answers aimed at you rather than the partner, with no check-in with the partner (Tatkin calls this "management of thirds"). Watch also for a partner who describes the other without checking with them. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

4.2 Partner interview (PAI) and attachment assessment by somatic markers

Purpose: gauge each partner's attachment organisation, so you can predict where threat and soothing will fail. [source: Erickson cc19-11] The Institute names the "PAI" as a core assessment and intervention, and Solomon and Tatkin's clinician book has a chapter titled "The partner interview" and an appendix-type chapter on the Adult Attachment Interview. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; Love and War table of contents] The PAI is commonly expanded as "Partner Attachment Interview", but the sources give only the initials. [uncertain] In Tatkin's popular framework, the styles are anchors (secure), islands (avoidant, inclined to self-regulate) and waves (ambivalent or angry-resistant, inclined to need external regulation). [source: Wired for Love via review; psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis; the PAI's question set is not published]: conduct the interview with both partners present, so the listening partner hears it and you can cross-track them (4.4). Ask about early caregivers, comfort when distressed, separations and losses. Note how the person speaks as well as what they say: coherence, dismissing or preoccupied discourse, lapses. At the same time watch the body: gaze aversion, flat or flooded affect, self-touch, leaning towards or away.
Note: the AAI chapter shows that AAI-informed interviewing is part of the published approach. Whether clients receive a formal, coded AAI is not stated; do not code an AAI without AAI training. [uncertain]
Example language (illustrative): "When you were small and upset, who did you go to, and what happened when you did?"
Watch for: the avoidant pattern (moves easily from being together to being alone, not back) versus the angry-resistant pattern (struggles to shift from interaction to being alone, fears being dropped). [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

4.3 Deficit assessment (defences versus deficits)

Purpose: find alexithymia, affect blindness (trouble reading faces), poor theory of mind, and related structural limits. These need teaching, not interpretation. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2012); cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Ask partner A to name the feeling on partner B's face right now.
2. Ask A to predict what B will say next, or to explain why B reacted.
3. Ask each partner to name their own current feeling and where they notice it in the body.
4. If the person consistently can't do this, even when calm and cooperative, treat it as a likely deficit. If they can do it when calm and lose it when threatened or when it suits them, treat it as a likely defence.
Example language (illustrative): "Look at her now. What do you see on her face?"
Watch for: repeated failure on neutral material (suggests a deficit) versus selective failure (suggests a defence). [synthesis]

4.4 Cross-tracking

Purpose: watch the non-speaking partner for subtle reactions while the other talks, without assuming why they move or self-soothe. [source: Erickson cc19-11, 2019 "cross-tracking, staging and data gathering" listing]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. While A speaks, keep part of your attention on B's face, hands, breathing and posture.
2. Note shifts such as a jaw clench, looking away, a hand to the face, a change in breathing.
3. Ask about the shift openly, without interpreting it.
Example language (illustrative): "Something just moved across your face when he said 'always'. What happened in you?"
Watch for: reactions the partners don't notice. These become material for 4.12 (coaching partners to read cues).

4.5 Down the middle

Purpose: make strong, balanced statements to the couple as a unit, to stop acting out and get joint action. [source: Erickson cc19-11; PACT tag listing (2016)]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Turn your body to face the space between the partners.
2. Address both at once with a statement that holds both equally responsible.
3. Follow it with a joint task.
Example language (illustrative): "Right now neither of you is protecting the other. You're both fighting for yourselves. Can the two of you turn towards each other and fix this together?"
Watch for: one partner hearing it as blame and the other as vindication. If that happens, restate it as symmetrical.

4.6 Cross-questioning and circular questions

Purpose: ask each partner about the other, adapting Milan-group circular questioning, to test what they know about each other and prompt reflection. Tatkin describes cross-questioning as relaxed but probing questions, paired with watching the non-speaking partner's reactions, to get more truthful answers. He lists it among techniques usable without full PACT training. [source: Erickson cc19-11, cc12-05; PACT tag listing (2018)]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Ask A a question about B's inner world, in a relaxed tone.
2. While A answers, watch B (4.4).
3. Turn to B and check whether A got it right.
4. Reverse the roles.
5. Gaps in knowledge become goals: "becoming experts on each other" (4.25).
Example language (illustrative): "What does she need from you when she gets home late and stressed?" Then, to her: "Is he right?"
Watch for: confident wrong answers, partners speaking for each other without checking, and the listening partner's face contradicting the answer.

4.7 Cross-commenting

Purpose: give immediate feedback, especially to open up avoidant partners. Adjust to the client's response, which Tatkin's outline grades as "hot", "warm" or "cold". [source: Erickson cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Comment straight away on what you just saw.
2. Read the response as hot (defensive, escalating), warm (engaged) or cold (shut down).
3. Turn the intensity down if the response is hot, keep going if it is warm, and come in closer and more personally if it is cold.
Example language (illustrative): "You went quiet and looked at the floor the moment she raised her voice. I don't think that was a decision."
Watch for: a cold partner warming up (more eye contact, more words). The exact meaning of the hot, warm and cold terms is taught in training and not published. [uncertain]

4.8 Flagging and narrative tracking

Purpose: flag behaviour that stands out under stress, and track narrative coherence using Paul Grice's conversational maxims (quantity, quality, relation, manner) to detect inconsistency or evasion. [source: Erickson cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. As someone talks, note where they say too much or too little, claims that don't add up, answers that don't fit the question, or vague and tangled phrasing.
2. Flag it neutrally, then return to the question.
Example language (illustrative): "I asked what happened that night, and you told me about the week before. Let's go back to that night."
Watch for: violations clustering around one topic. That is often where a hidden agenda or betrayal sits.

4.9 Corralling questions and recognition questions

Purpose: use pointed, strategic questions to bring unspoken issues and misalignments into the open. "Corralling questions" are a named Level 2 intervention. [source: Erickson cc19-11; PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Narrow the options until the partner has to recognise or deny a specific position.
2. Ask the partner to say it to their partner, not to you.
Example language (illustrative): "So it isn't the dishes and it isn't the money. Is it that you don't feel chosen? Tell her, not me."
Watch for: recognition you can see (a pause, softening, tears) versus a reflexive "no".

4.10 Deception and truth detection

Purpose: detect lies and hidden agendas through proximity, observation and strategic pressure, while understanding why people deceive. [source: Erickson cc19-11; PACT tag listing (2017 keynotes)]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Roll the partners closer, face to face.
2. Ask the critical question directly.
3. Watch the micro-expressions and voice of both partners as it is answered (4.4, 4.8).
4. Revisit the question later from a different angle.
Example language (illustrative): "Look at him and tell him: is there anyone else?"
Watch for: the cost to the alliance. Explain early in treatment that you will ask hard questions, so it doesn't feel like an ambush. [synthesis]

B. Staging and working in the moment

4.11 Staging and enactments (re-enactments)

Purpose: recreate the couple's real difficulty in the room, in the aroused state where it happens, so implicit memories surface in real time and can be corrected. The Institute describes the therapist asking the couple to "recreate the scene" of a conflict. "PACT posing and staging" is a named Level 2 skill. Tatkin draws on psychodrama (Moreno), Gestalt and Satir, and uses surprising set-ups to break old procedural patterns. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"; PACT Institute Level 2 course page; psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson cc19-11, cc12-05, PACT tag listing]
Steps [source: PACT Institute blog, "Staging to Influence the Thermostat in Couple Therapy" (Ferrari, 2020), for steps 1–6; step 7 synthesis; treat each staging as a container with a set task, timing and roles, 4.37]:
1. Settle your own body before you intervene: notice your own tension and let it go.
2. Ask how you can help and hear each partner's complaint. Reflect the emotional temperature back and pause so it lands.
3. Have the partners turn their chairs to face each other.
4. Ask one partner to tell the other directly what they are upset about. If they hold back, encourage them to say it more fully, while staying supportive.
5. When the listener answers you instead of the partner, redirect them to the partner.
6. Let the exchange run as an experiment. Watch for something new (tears, a changed tone, a playful look) rather than the usual script.
7. When the familiar pattern appears, freeze and correct (4.12), then replay with the new behaviour until it runs more smoothly. For a recurring flashpoint, set the scene physically first (where each stands or sits, at what distance) and have them start it as it usually goes.
Example language (illustrative): "Show me Tuesday night. You've just come in the door. Where is she? Stand there. Now go."
Watch for: arousal going beyond the window of tolerance (flooding or shutdown). Interrupt before injury, not after. Do not stage around physical violence (see section 5). [synthesis]

4.12 Real-time interruption, correction and coaching partners to read cues

Purpose: the moment the couple stops collaborating, interrupt, point out where it went off track, and have them correct it while still in that state. Coach each partner to notice the other's cues, so the partners take over the job of reading and soothing. [source: GoodTherapy; psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Stop the interaction, by voice or by a hand signal.
2. Name the cue that was missed, for example the partner's face falling.
3. Ask the partner who missed it to look again and say what they see.
4. Ask them to respond to it, by soothing, clarifying or touching if invited.
5. Resume.
Example language (illustrative): "Stop. Did you see what happened on her face just then? Look again. What do you see? What would help her right now?"
Watch for: the time from rupture to repair getting shorter, and partners starting to self-correct without your prompt.

4.13 Video recording and frame-by-frame playback

Purpose: let partners see their interaction objectively, including micro-expressions they missed. [source: GoodTherapy; Erickson PACT tag listing (2011, 2007); psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Record the session from the start, with written consent and clear storage and deletion rules.
2. After an enactment, play the key few seconds back, slowing or pausing on the critical frame.
3. Ask each partner what they see on their own face and on the other's.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's watch those three seconds again. Look at your own face when he turns away."
Watch for: shame at seeing oneself. Frame it as "this is your nervous system, not your character". [synthesis]

4.14 Positioning, movement, proximity and rolling chairs

Purpose: use distance, angle, gaze and movement to change arousal and to reveal approach and withdrawal patterns. Movement has its own chapter in the clinician book ("The importance of movement"). The outlines name "rolling chairs" and a "crossing" method. The Institute's example: a partner moves round to the other side of his wife and asks her to look into his eyes, which orients her to the present. [source: Love and War table of contents; PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"; psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson PACT tag listing (2016, 2011)]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Start the partners several feet apart, facing each other.
2. Move them closer, change sides or angle them during difficult dialogue.
3. Notice who rolls back, turns away or reaches forward.
4. Change one variable at a time and ask what shifted inside each of them.
The "crossing" method is not described in published sources. [uncertain] For the walking toward-and-away assessment, see 4.40.
Example language (illustrative): "Roll a little closer. Knees nearly touching. Now say it again, looking at her."
Watch for: arousal changing with distance. For some partners, closeness calms; for others, it threatens.

4.15 Beckoning exercise

Purpose: each partner silently signals the other to come to them. This shows attachment, empathy and bonding difficulties in action. Beckoning is a named Level 2 assessment and intervention. [source: Erickson cc19-11; PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Place the partners across the room from each other.
2. A beckons B without words.
3. Observe how A invites and how B approaches: speed, hesitation, gaze, what B does on arrival.
4. Swap roles, then ask each partner what they felt.
Example language (illustrative): "Without words, invite him over to you. You, just respond however your body wants to."
Watch for: half-hearted invitations, approaching then stalling, or arriving without contact. Use these as entry points for formulation.

4.16 Bending metal

Purpose: push a partner fully towards, or fully away from, the relationship to test commitment and get a clear declaration. A named Level 2 intervention, listed beside "declarations of commitment" (4.41). [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson cc19-11; PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Use this when a partner is ambivalent or sitting on the fence.
2. Exaggerate one side of the ambivalence: "so you're done", or "so you're all in".
3. Hold that position until the partner pushes back with their own position.
4. Have them say that position to their partner.
Example language (illustrative): "It sounds like you've already left. Maybe we should be planning how to separate well."
Watch for: a real pushback (a clear "no, I want this") versus collapse. This needs a strong alliance, and should not be used with a partner at risk of suicide or with coercive control present. [synthesis]

4.17 Pressure techniques and the staged "let's divorce" session

Purpose: bring out hidden agendas, such as one partner secretly wanting to leave, and make sure every option has been explored before separation is considered. Tatkin describes staging a "let's divorce" session and going at it "full bore" to see whether the partner pushes back. He says most threats to leave are used to control the partner, and fall away once exposed. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Tell the couple in advance that you will take a position and act it out.
2. Walk through the practicalities of separation concretely: who moves out, how the children are told.
3. Watch both partners' reactions.
4. Stop, and ask each what they actually want.
Example language (illustrative): "Let's take it seriously. Who would move out, and where would you live?"
Watch for: relief, which may be a real wish to leave, versus panic or protest, which suggests the threat was being used as leverage. Your goal is clarity, not a particular outcome. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

4.18 Psychodrama and empty-chair work

Purpose: use psychodrama and empty-chair methods within PACT. In Tatkin's containers workshop, psychodrama means the partners replay a recent event step by step while the therapist acts as an investigator gathering the facts. Empty-chair work is also used, for example to bring out contrition in anger repair. [source: Erickson cc22-06; PACT tag listing (2022 keynote); cc19-11]
Steps, event replay [source: Erickson cc22-06 for the frame; detailed steps synthesis]:
1. Choose a recent incident both partners remember.
2. Have them replay it moment by moment, in the positions they were in.
3. As investigator, ask factual questions (who said what, where, what happened next) without taking sides.
4. Cross-track both partners (4.4) for somatic "leakage" as each moment is replayed.
Steps, empty chair [synthesis]: put an empty chair in place for an absent figure; have one partner speak to it while the other witnesses; then turn the speaker to face their real partner and say what has emerged.
Example language (illustrative): "Take me through Saturday from the moment you got in the car. I'm just the detective here. Where were you sitting?"
Watch for: trauma activation. Set an exit and a grounding plan before you start. [synthesis]

C. Bottom-up regulation

4.19 Face-to-face, eye-to-eye co-regulation and quick repair

Purpose: partners practise soothing each other face to face and eye to eye, and repair distress quickly enough that the event is not stored as an injury. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. After a stressful enactment, roll the partners close.
2. Ask them to hold soft eye contact.
3. Ask the distressed partner what would help.
4. The other offers it: words, tone, touch if welcome.
5. Keep going until you can see both of them settle (slower breathing, softer face).
Example language (illustrative): "Stay with her eyes. What does she need from you right now to come down?"
Watch for: eye contact being aversive for one partner, which can point to trauma or a deficit. Go step by step rather than forcing it. [synthesis]

4.20 Informal trance induction

Purpose: use proximity, sustained eye contact, voice and movement to induce an informal, trance-like state of absorbed, lowered arousal in which implicit, procedural material and attachment wounds become accessible. Tatkin teaches posing (partners holding still positions) as a core tool for managing arousal and attention and for inducing this state. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2016); Erickson BT16 Workshop 41 abstract]
Steps: the workshop abstract names the elements: partners seated close and facing each other, sustained eye contact, the therapist's voice, and cross-questions that each partner answers about the other while keeping their gaze (4.6); the therapist monitors safety and gives guidance before and after. [source: Erickson BT16 Workshop 41 abstract] The order and the detailed induction are taught in training and are not published. [uncertain] Without that training, use only the general elements: consent and an agreed way to stop, slowed pacing, soft gaze, closeness, a quiet voice, and a debrief afterwards. [synthesis]
Example language (illustrative): "Just look at each other. Nothing to say. Notice what happens as you stay."
Watch for: dissociation instead of absorption, such as a glazed look or a partner who stops responding. If you see it, bring them back by orienting to the room. [synthesis]

4.21 Lover's Pose and PACT posing (and its variants)

Purpose: a comfortable body position held by the partners, not the therapist. It can be held for an hour or more and moves the body towards a calmer state, where attachment memories and patterns become accessible. The therapist casts the partners in roles to fit the goal: lovers' embrace, mother and infant, sibling, or Pietà-style hold. [source: Erickson bt18 Lover's Pose demonstration]
Steps: the training teaches a three-step way into and out of the pose and at least four ways to cast roles; while partners hold the pose, Tatkin asks cross-questions and probes implicit issues, with guidance before and after. [source: Erickson bt18; Erickson BT16 Workshop 41 abstract] The detailed steps are taught in training and are not published. [uncertain] General safety steps [synthesis]:
1. Get explicit consent from each partner first.
2. Agree how either partner can stop.
3. Keep eye contact central.
4. Stay closely attuned throughout.
5. Debrief afterwards.
Example language (illustrative): "I'd like to try something where you hold her and you're held. Either of you can stop at any point. Is that okay with you both?"
Watch for: heart rate usually drops after an initial stress response. The pose can bring out role reversal or difficulty letting go, and can be destabilising, so it requires a strong alliance. [source: Erickson bt18] Contraindicated where there is current violence or coercion, or where one partner can't freely refuse. [synthesis]

4.22 King and Queen

Purpose: a body-based positioning technique for power dynamics. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2016)]
Steps: not described in published sources. Don't improvise it under this name. [uncertain]

4.23 Play zone ("tense and let go")

Purpose: teach couples to stay in a playful, safe state even while fighting, letting tension build and release. Tatkin likens it to setting fires and putting them out. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Use playful exaggeration or teasing that both partners agree is safe.
2. Watch for the point where play tips into threat.
3. Have them bring it back down together, for example with a smile, a touch or a joke.
Example language (illustrative): "Can you two argue about this and still have fun? Let's see how close to the edge you can get and still pull it back."
Watch for: one partner's "play" being the other's threat. Check in with both of them.

4.24 Voice modulation, play and biofeedback

Purpose: use prosody (tone of voice) to soothe, and use physiological feedback to show arousal in real time. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2011)] For music and surprise statements, see 4.47.
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Coach a partner to repeat the same sentence in a softer, slower, lower voice, and ask the other partner what changed.
2. If you use a heart-rate or HRV device, show both partners the readings as they talk.
Example language (illustrative): "Same words, but slower and softer. Watch what happens to his shoulders."
Watch for: a partner who can't change their prosody, which may point to a deficit (4.3).

D. Education, agreements and couple practices

Wired for Love is written for couples. The principles below are taken from its chapter titles and from a review's list of its ten principles. The book's own home exercises are not reproduced here; each step is the writer's clinical operationalisation. [source: Wired for Love table of contents (Perlego); Siderite review] [synthesis]

4.25 Becoming experts on each other (how to please and soothe)

Purpose: each partner learns, and keeps up to date, a working "manual" of what distresses the other and what soothes, pleases and reassures them. [source: Wired for Love ch. "Becoming Experts on One Another"; GoodTherapy]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. In session, use cross-questioning (4.6) to test what each partner knows.
2. Have each partner name three things that reliably soothe them and three that reliably threaten them. The other partner repeats them back and checks.
3. Test them live in session.
4. Set as homework: try one soother daily and report back.
Example language (illustrative): "You're the world's expert on her, or you're supposed to be. What works fastest when she's upset?"
Watch for: "expertise" built on what you would want. Insist that the partner confirms it.

4.26 Psychobiological education

Purpose: explain arousal (fight-flight versus shutdown), threat detection and attachment styles. Tatkin's popular framing contrasts fast "primitives" (such as the amygdala) with slower "ambassadors". The aim is to reduce blame and make reactions workable. [source: GoodTherapy; Siderite review of Wired for Love; psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Teach briefly, tied to something that just happened in session.
2. Name each partner's tendency (anchor, island or wave) as a strategy, not an identity.
3. Ask each partner to say how it shows up in them.
Example language (illustrative): "When his voice gets loud, your brain registers danger before you've had a single thought. That isn't a choice, but what you both do next is."
Watch for: the labels being used as weapons ("you're such an island"). Redirect to shared responsibility. [synthesis]

4.27 Couple bubble agreements and managing thirds

Purpose: set up a mutually protective agreement that puts the relationship first, with "thirds" (children, work, in-laws, friends, devices, substances, affairs) secondary to and managed by the couple. Partners protect each other in public and don't let each other become the "third wheel". [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Wired for Love ch. "The Couple Bubble" and "Protecting the Couple Bubble"; Siderite review]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Work out with the couple a short set of shared agreements, for example: we don't put each other down in front of others; we check with each other before committing to third parties; we tell each other first.
2. Each partner says the agreements to the other, face to face.
3. Review them at each session.
Example language (illustrative): "What do the two of you agree on, so that nobody outside this relationship comes before it?"
Watch for: one-sided rules. Under the fairness principle, any agreement has to be good for both.

4.28 Launchings and landings (morning and bedtime rituals) and reunions

Purpose: use daily routines for separating and reuniting so that partners stay connected despite busy lives. The Institute describes couples experimenting in session with different ways of greeting each other. [source: Wired for Love ch. "Launchings and Landings: How to Use Morning and Bedtime Rituals"; PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"; Siderite review (mentions reunion rituals)]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Map the couple's current morning, departure, reunion and bedtime.
2. Design one small, reliable ritual for each, such as a few minutes of face-to-face contact before leaving, a greeting on reunion before anything else, or going to bed at the same time where practical.
3. Rehearse the reunion in session as a staging exercise (4.11), trying several ways of greeting and asking each partner which felt best.
Example language (illustrative): "What's the first thing that happens when one of you walks in the door? Let's try a few different ways of doing it."
Watch for: rituals done mechanically. Ask whether each partner felt received.

4.29 The go-to people

Purpose: each partner is the other's first and primary go-to person, reliably available. [source: Wired for Love ch. "The Go-To People"; Siderite review]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Identify who each partner actually goes to first with good news, bad news and fear.
2. If it isn't the partner, explore why.
3. Agree specific availability commitments, such as response times and how to reach each other.
Example language (illustrative): "When something bad happens at work, who's the first person you tell?"
Watch for: a parent, child or friend as the actual go-to. That third needs managing (4.27).

4.30 Fighting well

Purpose: fight so that nobody loses: "win by letting your partner win, too" (chapter subtitle). Fight for the relationship, not against the partner. [source: Wired for Love ch. "Fighting Well"; Siderite review]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. In a staged disagreement (4.11), keep the partners close and face to face.
2. Interrupt any move that is win-lose.
3. Ask: "what would make this a win for both of you?"
4. Agree that the fight isn't over until both are relieved.
Example language (illustrative): "If one of you wins this, you both lose. What outcome would work for both of you?"
Watch for: sham agreements to end the discomfort. Check both faces.

4.31 Love is up close: eye contact at home

Purpose: rekindle connection through sustained eye contact. A review also mentions hugging until the partner relaxes in your arms. [source: Wired for Love ch. "Love Is Up Close"; Siderite review]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Start in session with brief, soft gazing (4.19).
2. Debrief it.
3. Assign a short daily practice of eye contact and a long, relaxed hug.
Example language (illustrative): "A few minutes a day, just looking, no talking. Notice what you see in each other's faces."
Watch for: discomfort, which is common. Shorten the practice rather than drop it, unless trauma makes it aversive. [synthesis]

4.32 Building shared rituals and collaborative solutions

Purpose: turn household conflict cycles into jointly designed solutions and rituals. [source: Erickson cc19-11]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Pick one recurring cycle, such as chores, money or the children.
2. Have the couple design a solution together, face to face.
3. Have each partner state what makes it fair for them.
4. Trial it, and review at the next session.
Example language (illustrative): "Design this together so you both walk away satisfied. I'll stay out of it."
Watch for: one partner designing it and the other complying.

4.33 Working with betrayal

Purpose: repair after an affair or another betrayal. In Tatkin's outline, the betrayer accepts the injured partner's anger and gives full transparency, and healing often takes about a year. Tatkin frames affairs as an aversion towards the primary partner, rather than attraction to the third person. [source: Erickson cc19-11; psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Assess whether the affair has ended.
2. Set up transparency agreements, such as open devices and answering questions honestly.
3. Coach the betrayer to stay present with the injured partner's anger without defending.
4. Explore what in the primary relationship was being avoided.
5. Expect anger to recur, and treat each episode as a chance to repair.
Example language (illustrative): "Your job right now is not to explain. It's to stay with her and let her see that you can take it."
Watch for: the betrayer pushing for quick forgiveness, and transparency becoming surveillance with no end point.

4.34 Distinguishing "can't comply" from "won't comply"

Purpose: decide whether a failure to collaborate comes from dysregulation (can't) or from acting out or bad faith (won't), and respond to each differently. [source: PACT Institute blog]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Lower arousal first: slow down, soften, adjust distance.
2. If the partner can now do it, it was can't. Keep regulating and teaching.
3. If they still refuse when calm, it is likely won't. Name it directly, down the middle (4.5), and link it to the agreed principles.
Example language (illustrative): "You're calm now and you still won't look at her. That isn't your nervous system. That's a choice. What's it about?"
Watch for: confronting someone who is in a can't state, which escalates shame.

4.35 Clinical pause and compassionate request

Purpose (clinical pause): a deliberate, watchful silence after each intervention, so you see what the couple's system does with your move before you make the next one. The Institute treats it as part of the intervention, not an awkward silence or a loss of leadership. Use it after an observation, a challenge, a question or an invitation to turn toward the partner, inside containers (4.37), and whenever you feel the urge to speak again before you have seen the effect of your last move. [source: PACT Institute blog, "Using the Clinical Pause" (2026)]
Steps (clinical pause) [source: PACT Institute blog, "Using the Clinical Pause"]:
1. Make one short intervention, in fewer words than usual.
2. Stop talking and settle your own body. Ask yourself whether the urge to fill the silence is about the couple's anxiety or your own.
3. Watch both partners for several seconds: faces, bodies, voices, gaze, breathing, timing and where attention goes.
4. Track what changed, when it changed, whether it repeats and how the other partner responded.
5. Treat your intervention as a hypothesis and choose the next move from the response.
6. Read patterns and changes over time; a single cue proves nothing.
Purpose (compassionate request): a small, specific, calm request that restores enough safety for the partners to reconnect before they tackle the problem. It moves the pair from a one-person to a two-person focus and is relational, not problem-solving. Use it in conflict or distress once both partners can think; use it as a regular habit, not only after a rupture. [source: PACT Institute blog, "Compassionate Request: Stop the Spiral and Restore Safety Fast" (Arduman, 2026)]
Steps (compassionate request) [source: PACT Institute blog, "Compassionate Request"]:
1. Check that the person asking is regulated enough to ask without protest, accusation or pressure. If either partner is flooded, slow the pace and soften voices first.
2. Help the asker attune to the partner's state and co-regulate with them.
3. Remind both partners that they are on the same team.
4. Coach one small request that is specific, observable, immediate and easy to say yes to. A distressed, reaching partner (wave) names their experience, asks for one small regulating behaviour and moves to "we". An overloaded, withdrawing partner (island) acknowledges the other's need, reassures them that they are coming toward them, and asks for what lets them approach.
5. Coach the receiving partner to respond with relief, not defence or explanation.
6. Practise until it becomes a habit, and return to the unresolved issue later.
Example language (illustrative): clinical pause: "Something just shifted." (then silence, watching both). Compassionate request, wave: "Could you sit by me for a minute? It helps me calm down." Island: "I'm getting flooded. Give me a moment and I'll come back to you. Stay close."
Watch for: filling the silence to soothe yourself; treating one cue as proof. Step in more actively when the couple escalates, misreads each other or repeats an injury without repair. With requests: a request used to dodge the conflict or offered as the solution, a request delivered with pressure, a pause misread as rejection, and shame about needing closeness. [source: PACT Institute blog, "Using the Clinical Pause"; "Compassionate Request"]

4.36 Individual therapy within a primary relationship

Purpose: when the client is in a primary attachment relationship, aim to bring the partner into conjoint work. If the partner declines, act as an adjunct to the relationship and don't compete with it. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Steps [synthesis]:
1. Ask early on about the partner's view of therapy.
2. Invite the partner to a joint session.
3. In individual sessions, keep the partner's perspective present, for example: "what would she say?"
4. Don't become the client's primary confidant in place of the partner.
Example language (illustrative): "I'd like you to bring this to him, not just to me. Could he come in?"
Watch for: the therapy becoming the "third" that the client turns to instead of the partner.

E. Further named interventions from the Institute's Level 2 curriculum

The Level 2 learning objectives name the items below as PACT assessments and interventions. Where a workshop abstract describes one, that is cited. Otherwise only the name is sourced. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page]

4.37 Containers (structuring each exercise)

Purpose: organise each session so progress can be measured, by placing the couple, and sometimes the therapist, in discrete "containers": exercises that stress the couple. Each container has a task, timing and roles cast by the therapist, and may include a role the therapist plays. They are used for assessment and for intervention, and to spot implicit and explicit "behavioural leakage" in each partner's somatic reactions under stress. [source: Erickson cc22-06]
Steps [synthesis on the source's three elements]:
1. Decide what you want to test (for example, can they repair within a minute?).
2. Set the task, the time limit and each person's role, and say whether you have a role.
3. Run it, cross-tracking both partners (4.4).
4. Stop at the time limit and debrief what you saw.
5. Re-run the same container in later sessions to compare.
Example language (illustrative): "Here's the exercise: three minutes, you try to get him to agree, he only listens. I'll just keep time."
Watch for: containers so stressful that they flood a partner. The stress should be enough to show the pattern, not to injure.

4.38 Genograms

Purpose: a named first-session tool. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page]
Steps [synthesis; PACT's specific use of genograms is not published]: draw a three-generation family map for each partner, with both present. Note attachment figures, losses, how distress was handled, and patterns that repeat in the couple. Use it to feed the partner interview (4.2).
Example language (illustrative): "Let's map your family. Who looked after you, and who did you go to when things went wrong?"
Watch for: the listening partner's reactions to the other's family story (4.4).

4.39 GUSS: get, use, synthesis and summarise (first session)

Purpose: a named first-session skill set. The page gives only the expansion "get, use, synthesis, and summarize". [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] What each step involves is taught in training and not published. [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis, reading the four words literally]: get data from the history, interview and observed interactions; use it straight away in the session (for example, staging what you just heard); synthesise it into a working formulation of the couple system; and summarise it to the couple at the end, down the middle (4.5).
Example language (illustrative): "Let me tell you both what I've seen today and what I think it means for the two of you."
Watch for: a summary that sides with one partner. Check both faces as you give it.

4.40 Toward and Away (walking toward-and-away exercise)

Purpose: a named Level 2 assessment and intervention. In Tatkin's bottom-up-techniques workshop, partners walk toward and away from each other while being video-recorded, and the footage is played back straight away. It reveals approach and withdrawal reactions held in the body. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; Erickson cc12-05]
Steps [source for walk, record and immediate playback; ordering and debrief synthesis]:
1. Stand the partners apart with open floor between them; start recording.
2. Have one partner walk slowly toward the other, then away; then swap.
3. Play the recording back at once, slowing on moments of approach, arrival and leaving (4.13).
4. Ask each partner what they see on their own face and the other's, and what they felt.
Example language (illustrative): "Walk slowly toward her. Stop when it feels right. Now walk away. Let's look at the tape."
Watch for: reactions on arrival versus on leaving. Tatkin links difficulty shifting from togetherness to being alone, or from alone to together, to the wave and island patterns. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

4.41 Declarations of commitment

Purpose: a named Level 2 intervention, listed with bending metal. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] Its procedure is not published. [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis]: when both partners say they want the relationship, have each say it to the other, face to face and close, and watch whether face and body match the words. If one hesitates, go to bending metal (4.16).
Example language (illustrative): "Turn to him and tell him, looking at him, whether you are in this."
Watch for: words that the face contradicts.

4.42 Collaborative narratives

Purpose: a named Level 2 intervention. "Therapeutic narrative" is one of PACT's five domains. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; psychotherapy.net interview] Its procedure is not published. [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis]: have the couple tell a shared story together, such as how they met and why they chose each other (a first-session history question [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"]), and watch whether they build the story jointly, correct each other kindly, or compete.
Example language (illustrative): "Tell me together how you two met. Help each other tell it."
Watch for: one partner taking over, or contradictions left unrepaired. Coach them to co-tell it.

4.43 The 5-minute argument

Purpose: a named Level 2 intervention. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] Its procedure is not published; the name suggests a time-limited container (4.37). [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis]: set a live argument on a real issue with a five-minute limit; watch regulation, repair attempts and who escalates; stop on time; debrief and replay with corrections (4.12).
Example language (illustrative): "Five minutes. Pick something real. I'll stop you on time."
Watch for: whether they can end in relief rather than stalemate.

4.44 Change your partner's face

Purpose: a named Level 2 intervention. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] The Institute describes partners learning to read each other's expressions and to use eye contact, vocal inflection, proximity and touch to move the other from dysregulation to regulation. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"] Its exact procedure was not found. [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis]: when one partner's face shows distress, ask the other to change that face, using only gaze, voice, closeness and welcome touch, and to keep going until the face visibly softens.
Example language (illustrative): "Look at her face. Now, without explaining anything, change it."
Watch for: reliance on words or arguments instead of nonverbal soothing.

4.45 Playing catch

Purpose: a named Level 2 intervention. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] No description is published. Do not improvise a procedure under this name. [uncertain]

4.46 "Do you know how?", "What are the 3 or 4 things?", "What's your song?"

Purpose: three named Level 2 interventions, apparently built around these questions. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] No descriptions are published. [uncertain] The "3 or 4 things" question sits naturally with becoming experts on each other (4.25), and "What's your song?" with Tatkin's use of music (4.47), but these links are the writer's inference. [synthesis]

4.47 Surprise statements, movements, poses and music

Purpose: very fast, often surprising bottom-up interventions that reach implicit systems, read in micro-expressions and micro-movements. Music is used to evoke emotional memories and gauge the couple's emotional tone. [source: Erickson cc12-05]
Steps [synthesis]: make an unexpected statement, move or song choice at a point where the couple is running a familiar pattern; watch both faces in the first second or two; name what you saw and use it.
Example language (illustrative): "Before you answer, I'm going to play something. Just listen and watch each other."
Watch for: surprise that lands as mockery. Repair at once (section 5).

4.48 Lead with relief and level the playing field

Purpose: two named Level 2 interventions, listed with deal breakers, betrayal and projective identification. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page] No descriptions are published. [uncertain]
Steps [synthesis]: lead with relief fits Tatkin's principle that distress should be relieved quickly: open a hard conversation with what will relieve the other partner first. Level the playing field fits the fairness principle: correct imbalances in who talks, who decides and whose needs count (section 3, fairness and mutuality). Do not present these readings as the Institute's procedures.
Example language (illustrative): "Before you tell her what's wrong, tell her what she needs to hear first so she can listen."
Watch for: relief offered as appeasement rather than real reassurance.

4.49 Deal breakers: detection and the deal-breaker exercise

Purpose: a deal breaker is a conflict between partners for which there is no workable solution. It threatens the relationship, so partners avoid it and distort reality. Tatkin says the therapist must play the long game while partners play the short game. [source: Erickson cc17-11] In the containers workshop, partners try to persuade each other out of the deal-breaker position, and the therapist mediates only how they argue, not what. [source: Erickson cc22-06] Deal breakers are named in both Level 2 and Level 3. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; PACT Institute Level 3 course page]
Steps [frame from the sources; detailed steps synthesis; Tatkin's "well-defined process" for dissolving deal breakers is named in the workshop abstract but its steps are not published] [uncertain]:
1. Listen for issues where the couple says "we just don't talk about that" (children, location, religion, sex, money).
2. Name the possible deal breaker and bring it into focus.
3. Set the container: each tries to persuade the other; you police only fairness, regulation and listening.
4. Debrief whether the deal breaker has shifted, can be dissolved, or remains.
Example language (illustrative): "This sounds like it might be a deal breaker. If so, we can't keep going around it. Try to change his mind. I'll only step in on how you do it."
Watch for: the urge, including yours, to avoid the issue for the sake of short-term calm.

5. Handling problems

Items with a [source] tag come from Tatkin or Institute material. Everything tagged [synthesis] is the writer's guidance, consistent with PACT principles but not given in the sources.

Screen for safety before using provocative or body-based techniques [synthesis]. Bending metal, pressure, deception detection, proximity and the Lover's Pose all raise arousal or physical closeness.

Before using any of them, assess separately and privately for intimate partner violence, coercive control, current suicidality, active psychosis or mania, and severe substance intoxication.
If violence or coercion is present, don't stage conflict, push proximity or have partners hold each other.
Move to safety planning, and to individual or specialist IPV services, and use conjoint work only if and when it is safe.
For suicide risk, carry out standard risk assessment and safety planning, including lethal-means counselling about secure storage and removal. Don't use "let's divorce" pressure with an at-risk partner.

GoodTherapy also advises broader specialist input for major psychiatric illness, severe neurological deficit or suicidality. [source: GoodTherapy]

Overwhelm or flooding during an enactment.

Interrupt at once and lower arousal: increase the distance, slow your voice, orient them to the room. [synthesis]
Then either guide the partners into co-regulation face to face (4.19), if the flooded partner can tolerate closeness, or give a short individual settling first.
Repair before the session ends, so the episode isn't stored as an injury. Negatives should be "relieved quickly, not dismissed." [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Long sessions leave time to finish this. Don't let a session end in the middle of a rupture. [synthesis]

Highly disorganised or trauma-dysregulated partners.

Tatkin's outline emphasises structure, the therapist's stance, facial cues and pacing. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2015)]
In practice: be more predictable, use shorter enactments, use your own soft face and voice as a regulator, announce each step before you take it, and check consent for proximity at every step. [synthesis]

Avoidant (island) partner shut down or cold.

Use cross-commenting (4.7), adjusted to a cold response, and come in closer and more personally.
Use cross-tracking (4.4) to name small signs of engagement.
Tatkin notes that avoidant partners shift easily from being together to being alone, but not back. [source: Erickson cc19-11; psychotherapy.net interview]
So build up from being alone to being together in small steps (distance, brief eye contact), and frame closeness as a skill the relationship needs, not a demand. [synthesis]

Angry-resistant (wave) partner escalating or protesting.

This partner needs external regulation and fears being dropped. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]
Coach the other partner to give fast, explicit reassurance and physical presence. [synthesis]
Help the wave partner make a direct request rather than protest. [synthesis]
Distinguish can't from won't (4.34) before confronting.

Partners address the therapist, not each other. Redirect every time: "Tell her, not me." This is the management-of-thirds problem. [source: psychotherapy.net interview] Turn the chairs so they face each other. [synthesis]

Content arguments and stalemate. Move from what they are fighting about to how. [source: GoodTherapy; psychotherapy.net interview] Stage the stalemate (4.11) and correct the process. Once both partners are regulated, the content usually becomes negotiable (4.30). [synthesis]

Acting out, bad faith or "won't comply". Confront down the middle (4.5) and link the behaviour to the agreed secure-functioning principles. [source: Erickson cc19-11; PACT Institute blog] If it persists, name the choice the couple faces: secure functioning or the status quo. [synthesis]

One partner wants out, or hidden agendas. Use pressure techniques and bending metal (4.16, 4.17) to reach clarity. Tatkin: most threats to leave are used for control and fall away once exposed. You are not the arbiter of whether they stay together. [source: psychotherapy.net interview; Erickson cc19-11] If one partner has truly decided to leave, switch to helping them separate safely and fairly, especially where there are children. [synthesis]

Deception suspected. Use proximity and observation (4.10). Don't accuse on the basis of micro-expressions alone. Treat them as a hypothesis and ask. [synthesis]

Non-adherence to home rituals and agreements.

Assume first that the agreement was one-sided or too big. Shrink it, and check it is fair to both. [synthesis]
Stage the failed moment (for example, the reunion) in session to find where it breaks down. [synthesis]
If a partner repeatedly fails when calm, treat it as a won't (4.34).

Deficits misread as resistance. If a partner can't read faces or name feelings even when calm and cooperative (4.3), stop confronting. Teach in small steps, with the other partner's patience framed as part of secure functioning. [source: Erickson PACT tag listing (2012)] [synthesis on method]

Rupture with the therapist. Provocative and strategic moves can feel like being sided against or tricked. [synthesis]

Explain your active style and your intentions at intake.
Repair openly: name the move you made, why you made it, and its impact, and ask what would help.
Track your own arousal and countertransference. Tatkin stresses that the therapist must stay regulated, and treats a strong wish that the couple split as countertransference. [source: psychotherapy.net interview]

Personality-disordered dynamics (narcissistic, borderline), disorganisation and projective identification. These are Level 2 and Level 3 training topics: Level 2 teaches skills for disorganised partners and for projections and projective identification; Level 3 covers couples with disorganisation or personality disorders, defensive structures, transference and countertransference. Tatkin's workshops address them with real-time regulation, quick repair, joint sessions with video playback, cross-tracking and circular questioning, and distinguish structural deficit from insecure attachment. [source: PACT Institute Level 2 course page; PACT Institute Level 3 course page; Erickson PACT tag listing (2007, 2018, 2019)] The detailed procedures are taught in training and are not published. [uncertain]

Other named difficult situations. Level 3 lists sexual issues, addictions (behavioural and chemical), partners who "don't want to play", acting out, neuropsychological deficits needing referral, and gender, cultural and alternative-relationship needs. [source: PACT Institute Level 3 course page] The procedures are not published. [uncertain] Practical handling [synthesis]: assess addiction and refer for concurrent treatment; screen for neuropsychological deficit and refer for assessment; with a partner who won't take part in exercises, first check can't versus won't (4.34), then shrink the task and give it a time limit (4.37).

Betrayal recovery stalling. Expect about a year. Hold the betrayer to staying present with the anger and to full transparency. [source: Erickson cc19-11] If the injured partner's questioning becomes compulsive or retraumatising, agree a structure for when questions are asked and answered (for example, at set times), and consider individual trauma work alongside. [synthesis]

Lover's Pose or closeness destabilises a partner. Use the agreed stop signal, release the pose by the steps you agreed, ground the partner, and debrief. The source warns the pose can destabilise and requires a strong alliance and close attunement. [source: Erickson bt18] Don't repeat it until you understand what happened. [synthesis]

Video recording refused or shame-inducing. The Institute treats recording as optional. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"] Respect a refusal and work live. Offer playback only of short segments, framed as nervous-system data. [synthesis]

Session-length constraints or very high distress. The Institute describes shorter sessions, closer to an hour, two or three times a week, for very high distress. [source: PACT Institute blog, "PACT Therapy: How It Works"] If long sessions aren't possible for practical reasons, protect time for full enactment and repair within each session; fewer, longer sessions are an option. [synthesis]

Non-monogamous couples, or a relationship that isn't the primary attachment. A secondary source says PACT is less suited to these. [source: GoodTherapy] But the Institute's Level 3 training explicitly covers alternative-relationship needs, so the sources differ. [source: PACT Institute Level 3 course page] [uncertain] If you proceed, agree explicitly with the couple what "primary" and "thirds" mean for them. [synthesis]

Sources

Pages used:

Note: pacttraining.co.uk concerns a different "PACT" (Paediatric Autism Communication Therapy) and was not used.

Books and chapters cited (used through the previews, catalogue records and listings above):

Tatkin, S. (2012). Wired for Love: How Understanding Your Partner's Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship. New Harbinger. Some listings give 2011. [uncertain]
Solomon, M. F., & Tatkin, S. (2011). Love and War in Intimate Relationships: Connection, Disconnection, and Mutual Regulation in Couple Therapy. W. W. Norton.
Tatkin, S. (2009). A psychobiological approach to couple therapy: Integrating attachment and personality theory as interchangeable structural components. Psychologist-Psychoanalyst. Title as listed in a secondary bibliography. [uncertain]
Tatkin, S. (2018). We Do: Saying Yes to a Relationship of Depth, True Connection, and Enduring Love. Sounds True.
Tatkin, S. (2023). In Each Other's Care. Sounds True.

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