Movement Synchrony in the Psychotherapy of Adolescents With Borderline Personality Pathology – A Dyadic Trait Marker for Resilience?

Zimmermann, Ronan; Fürer, Lukas; Kleinbub, Johann R.; Ramseyer, Fabian T.; Hütten, Rahel; Steppan, Martin; Schmeck, Klaus (2021). Movement Synchrony in the Psychotherapy of Adolescents With Borderline Personality Pathology – A Dyadic Trait Marker for Resilience? Frontiers in psychology, 12, p. 660516. Frontiers Research Foundation 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.660516

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Movement synchrony describes the coordination of body movements. In psychotherapy, higher movement synchrony between therapist and patient has been associated with higher levels of empathy, therapeutic alliance, better therapy outcome, and fewer drop-outs. The current study investigated movement synchrony during the psychotherapeutic treatment of female adolescents with borderline personality disorder. It was hypothesized that there are higher levels of movement synchrony in the analyzed therapy sessions compared to pseudo-interactions. Further, we tested whether higher levels of movement synchrony correlate with stronger patients' symptom reduction and whether higher movement synchrony predicts higher post-session ratings. A total of 356 sessions from 16 completed psychotherapies of adolescent patients with BPD were analyzed. Movement synchrony was assessed with motion energy analysis and an index of synchrony was calculated by lagged cross-correlation analysis. As hypothesized, the findings support higher levels of movement synchrony in therapy sessions compared to pseudo-interactions (Cohen's d = 0.85). Additionally, a correlation of movement synchrony with better therapy outcome was found (standardized beta = -0.43 indicating stronger personality functioning impairment reduction). The post-session ratings were negatively associated with higher levels of movement synchrony (standardized beta = -0.1). The relevance of movement synchrony and potential implications for clinical practice are discussed.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

07 Faculty of Human Sciences > Institute of Psychology > Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy

UniBE Contributor:

Ramseyer, Fabian

Subjects:

600 Technology > 610 Medicine & health
100 Philosophy > 150 Psychology

ISSN:

1664-1078

Publisher:

Frontiers Research Foundation

Language:

English

Submitter:

Fabian Ramseyer

Date Deposited:

04 Feb 2022 11:09

Last Modified:

05 Dec 2022 15:52

Publisher DOI:

10.3389/fpsyg.2021.660516

PubMed ID:

34276484

BORIS DOI:

10.48350/157940

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/157940

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