The dyadic regulation of affect

Abstract

Accelerated Experiential-Dynamic Psychotherapy integrates experiential, relational and psychodynamic elements. Deep authentic affective experience and its regulation through coordinated emotional interchanges between patient and therapist are viewed as key transformational agents. When maintaining attachment with caregivers necessitates excluding particular affects, patients' capacity to regulate emotion becomes compromised. Being in an emotionally alive therapeutic relationship enables patients to better tolerate and communicate affective states; doing so, in turn, fosters security, openness, and intimacy in their other relationships. A clinical vignette will illustrate how using the therapist's affect, and focusing on the patient's experience of it, contributes to the repair of affect regulatory difficulties.

Emotion in an alliance rupture and resolution sequence: A theory‐building case study

“…Traditionally, emotional processing is defined as a process of the absorption of emotional disturbances which decline and leave way to other, healthier, experiences and behaviours (Rachman, 1980); this definition points to the sequential nature of the phenomenon of emotional processing. It also implies, in accordance with Greenberg and Paivio (1997) and Fosha (2000, 2001) that not all emotion experiencing and expression in psychotherapy is productive. Indeed, emotion transformation seems to occur by moving from least to most productive emotional experience in effective psychotherapy sessions.…”

Mentalización en Psicoterapia: Discusión Sobre lo Explícito e Implícito de la Relación Terapéutica

“…Sin embargo, se enfatiza que todo el proceso debiera ser comandado por este nivel implícito, no en el sentido de su importancia relativa, sino sugiriendo que acceder a través de esa vía puede ser más efi ciente. Esta afi rmación se basa en la importancia que en los últi-mos años se ha dado al tema de la regulación afectiva en la díada terapeuta-paciente ( ver Beebe & Lachman, 1998, 2002Fosha, 2001;Lyons-Ruth, 1999;Martínez 2010;Martínez, Tomicic, Medina, & Krause, 2011;Tomicic Martínez, Altimir, Bauer, & Reinoso, 2009), con sustento en la regulación mutua entre madre e hijo por un lado (Beebe & Lachman, 1988), y en estudios neurobiológicos sobre la coordinación de las estrategias afectivas del self (Schore, 1994). También aquí caben aquellos estudios que enfatizan la comunicación no verbal o de aspectos expresivos -como tono de voz o confi guración facial -en la relación terapéu-tica y la potencialidad que la experiencia a este nivel tendría en el desarrollo de la subjetividad (Español, 2007;Stern, 2000;Trevarthen, 2008).…”

Trauma Therapy for Death Row Families

“…Diana Fosha (2001) defined dyadic regulation as mutual coordination between family members of their emotion-handling strategies:…”

“…Therefore, family therapies that enhance intrafamilial attachment relationships through restructuring of the family and provision of tools for emotional regulation may provide the most hope for ameliorating the death row families' distress. The therapist's skilled shaping of the attachment relationships within and between the family's subsystems, combined with his or her experiential training in dyadic emotional regulation (e.g., Fosha, 2001) and assistance with meaning making, may best promote lasting relief in families suffering the trauma of a death sentence (Armour, 2003;Van Ecke, Chope, & Emmelkamp, 2006).…”