ABSTRACT
It is widely acknowledged in dance movement psychotherapy (DMP) that movement is the primary means of attuning empathically to clients, developing an unspoken dialogue, which fosters a deeper connection. As a client group, children with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) and severe learning disabilities/global developmental delay can often be quite hard to reach because of associated factors relating to their diagnosis: for example social isolation, communication impairments, challenging behaviour, and difficulties forming and sustaining relationships. Music therapy also utilises non-verbal means of attuning to this specific client group, and research indicates that such an approach has parallel processes with DMP. Due to the overall high needs of the young people in this setting there are rarely more than three children in a group. The combination of simultaneous music-and-movement attunement can also serve to contain difficult emotions as well as playful interactions. Using empathic movement reflection and musical attunement simultaneously became an integral part of our collaborative work in creative therapy (CT).
