Dance Movement Therapy (DMT)

Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) is a form of expressive therapy that uses movement to promote emotional, social, cognitive, and physical integration of the individual. It’s based on the premise that movement reflects an individual’s patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving. Through guided movement activities, individuals can explore and express their emotions, thoughts, and experiences in a non-verbal way.

DMT sessions are typically conducted by trained therapists who create a safe and supportive environment for clients to explore movement. Participants may engage in various exercises, improvisational movement, structured dances, and reflective discussions to deepen their self-awareness and promote healing.

This therapeutic approach is used to address a wide range of mental health issues, including depression, anxiety, trauma, eating disorders, and substance abuse. It can also be beneficial for individuals with developmental disabilities, neurological disorders, or chronic pain.

Overall, DMT aims to promote self-awareness, emotional regulation, stress reduction, interpersonal connection, and overall well-being by integrating the mind, body, and spirit through movement.

Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) uses:

Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) employs various techniques and approaches to facilitate therapeutic processes through movement and dance. Some common methods and practices used in DMT include:
  1. Free Movement: Participants are encouraged to move freely without inhibition, allowing their bodies to express themselves spontaneously.
  2. Structured Movement Activities: Therapists may guide clients through structured movement exercises designed to address specific therapeutic goals, such as improving body awareness, releasing tension, or exploring emotions.
  3. Dance Improvisation: Clients engage in spontaneous movement exploration, allowing them to express themselves creatively and authentically in the moment.
  4. Guided Imagery: Therapists may use verbal prompts or storytelling to guide clients through imagined movement experiences, tapping into their subconscious and facilitating emotional expression.
  5. Mirroring and Synchrony: Participants may engage in mirroring exercises or synchronized movement with the therapist or other group members, promoting connection, empathy, and attunement.
  6. Ritual and Symbolism: Therapists may incorporate rituals, gestures, or symbolic movements into sessions to explore deeper meanings and facilitate transformation.
  7. Integration of Music and Rhythm: Music is often used to accompany movement in DMT sessions, providing a rhythmic structure and emotional resonance that enhances the therapeutic experience.
  8. Reflective Processing: Clients have opportunities to reflect on their movement experiences, explore the symbolism behind their movements, and gain insights into their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

These techniques are tailored to meet the unique needs and preferences of each client, creating a personalized and holistic approach to healing and growth through movement.

What Is Dance/Movement Therapy?

Dance/movement therapy, or DMT, is the psychotherapeutic use of movement to promote emotional, social, cognitive, and physical integration.1 DMT can help people with physical health by increasing strength, improving flexibility, decreasing muscle tension, and boosting coordination. It can also offer important mental health benefits including stress reduction and even symptom relief from conditions such as anxiety and depression.

“DMT is a creative art psychotherapy that utilizes movement and dance to support the physical, intellectual, and emotional health of an individual,” Katie Bohn, LPC, BC-DMT, SEP, RYT, a board-certified dance/movement therapist.

According to board-certified dance therapist Erica Hornthal, MA, LCPC, BC-DMT, dance therapy uses movement and nonverbal communication in addition to talk therapy to manage psychological and behavioral concerns that words alone do not address. “It’s about finding the places inside that you might not know or have chosen to deny, and giving a voice to the experiences and emotions,” Hornthal says.

Techniques

DMT looks different for everyone depending on a sense of safety, access to the body, and personal familiarity with an authentic expression of the body, explains Caroline Kinsley, LPC intern, R-DMT, a dance/movement therapist. “The process may range from mostly verbal or speaking to mostly nonverbal or movement,” she says.
In a dance therapy session, a therapist may:
  • Help you explore and make meaning on the connection between movement and your emotions
  • Encourage tracking of bodily sensations and breath
  • Help guide you through self-expressive and improvisational movements
  • Offer specific movement or verbal therapeutic interventions to promote healing
  • Help you process the feelings evoked by the movement
Dance therapists may utilize a technique known as mirroring, which involves copying another person’s movements. It can be a way to help people feel more connected to others and to build feelings of empathy.
Dance/movement therapists provide the space for individuals to experience an invitation, a sense of choice, validation, and to tolerate internal sensations. They also offer compassionate and supportive ways to feel a sense of control and autonomy within your body.

What Dance/Movement Therapy Can Help With

Dance and movement therapy can be used to treat a number of physical and mental health issues. It can be helpful for improving self-esteem and can be useful for people who struggle with body image issues. Some conditions that it may help with include:
  • Anxiety
  • Arthritis
  • Chronic pain
  • Communication issues
  • Dementia
  • Depression
  • Disordered eating
  • Low self-esteem
  • Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
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Benefits of Dance/Movement Therapy

Dance therapy has a number of benefits that can make it a helpful addition to other treatment approaches. Where many treatment modalities, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), focus on cognitions or behaviors, dance/movement therapy incorporates body-based strategies.
  • Promotes calm: By using DMT, a therapist can provide body-based strategies to support down-regulating the system, which allows for an increased sense of calm.
  • Self-awareness: In the treatment of eating disorders, building self-awareness can help people feel more connected to their body’s physical signals. “Emphasis on the body supports the client in developing the awareness needed to identify physical and emotional sensations of hunger and fullness.”
  • Coping skills: DMT can also serve as a way to build coping skills to use outside of the therapy setting. “With the support of the therapist, you can use movement and understanding of your movement preferences to explore strengths and signals of stress, distress, and triggers.
  • Anxiety
  • Arthritis
  • Chronic pain
  • Communication issues
  • Dementia
  • Depression
  • Disordered eating
  • Low self-esteem
  • Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
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Building such skills allows you to recognize the change in your body-based experience outside of the therapeutic space and use it as insight if you are tending towards maladaptive beliefs or behaviors.

If you’re struggling with an eating disorder or another issue that affects body image, DMT helps you to be able to reconnect with your body, change the relationship with your body, have access to self-expression, and experience embodied relationships is significant in sustaining eating disorder recovery. Dance/movement therapy is a unique modality that supports these goals. 

Dance / Movement Therapy (DMT)

Dance/movement therapy, usually referred to simply as dance therapy or DMT, is a type of therapy that uses movement to help individuals achieve emotional, cognitive, physical, and social integration. Beneficial for both physical and mental health, dance therapy can be used for stress reduction, disease prevention, and mood management. In addition, DMT’s physical component offers increased muscular strength, coordination, mobility, and decreased muscular tension. Dance/movement therapy can be used with all populations and with individuals, couples, families, or groups. In general, dance therapy promotes self-awareness, self-esteem, and a safe space for the expression of feelings.

WHAT KIND OF ISSUES CAN DANCE THERAPY HELP WITH?

Dance therapists work with people in therapy to help them improve their body image and self-esteem. Dance/movement therapy is a versatile form of therapy founded on the idea that motion and emotion are interconnected. The creative expression of dance therapy can bolster communication skills and inspire dynamic relationships. It is commonly used to treat physical, psychological, cognitive, and social issues such as:

Cognitive Issues:

  • Dementia
  • Communication issues

Social Issues:

  • Autism
  • Aggression/violence
  • Domestic violence trauma
  • Social interaction
  • Family conflict

Physical Issues:

  • Chronic pain
  • Childhood obesity
  • Cancer
  • Arthritis
  • Hypertension
  • Cardiovascular disease

Mental Health Issues:

  • Anxiety
  • Depression
  • Disordered eating
  • Poor self-esteem
  • Posttraumatic stress