Sabine C. Koch

Sabine C. Koch
Alanus University Alfter, RIArT / SRH University Heidelberg · Creative Arts Therapies

PhD (Prof. Dr. phil. habil.)

About

224
Publications
226,202
Reads
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4,380
Citations
Introduction
My research interests are in the area of embodiment and related theoretical approaches such as enaction, dynamic systems theory, ecological approaches, which understand the human condition as based upon its organismic nature with its capacity for self-organization and interactional resonance. We apply this approach in the area of creative arts therapies, where music, art, dance, theatre, poetry, and play are used for promoting physical, social, and psychological health and body mind unity.
Additional affiliations
October 2012 - June 2017
SRH Hochschule Heidelberg/Alanus Hochschule Alfter, Director of Research Institute
Position
  • Head of Department
October 2015 - present
Alanus Hochschule Alfter
Position
  • Director of Research Institute in Arts Therapies (RIArT)
Position
  • Professor of Dance Movement Therapy
Education
October 1992 - March 1999
Heidelberg University
Field of study
  • Psychology; thereof 1995-1997 M.A. Dance Movement Therapy

Publications

Publications (224)
Article
Full-text available
Body feedback is the proprioceptive feedback that denominates the afferent information from position and movement of the body to the central nervous system. It is crucial in experiencing emotions, in forming attitudes and in regulating emotions and behavior. This paper investigates effects of dynamic body feedback on affect and attitudes, focusing...
Article
What is it that makes the arts therapies a special source of healing? This article will provide an overview of central specific active factors effective in the arts therapies that (a) can be distinguished from therapeutic factors of other medical and psychotherapies, and (b) that can be assumed to work as mechanisms of effectiveness across the arts...
Article
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In the context of embodiment research, there has been a growing interest in phenomena of interpersonal resonance. Given that haptic communication is particularly under-researched, we focused on the phenomenon of embracing. When we embrace a dear friend to say good-bye at the end of a great evening, we typically first employ smooth and yielding move...
Article
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Background: Dance is an embodied activity and, when applied therapeutically, can have several specific and unspecific health benefits. In this meta-analysis, we evaluated the effectiveness of dance movement therapy¹(DMT) and dance interventions for psychological health outcomes. Research in this area grew considerably from 1.3 detected studies/year...
Article
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Dance movement therapy is increasingly established as an evidence-based treatment modality in health care. However, systematic knowledge on indications and contraindications of dance movement therapy (DMT) are widely lacking. In this study, we developed a questionnaire to learn from practitioners’ experience with DMT intervention methods for specif...
Preprint
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Background: The increase in life expectancy and age-related diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, is a global challenge. Given the drawbacks of pharmacological treatments, it is important to pursue non-pharmacological strategies for dementia risk reduction. To effectively promote health and well-being in later life, multimodal, low-threshold, and...
Article
"Tanztherapie im Sitzen“ ist eine wunderbare, sehr praxisorientierte Neuerscheinung, die uns einen Einblick in die tanztherapeutische Arbeit mit Menschen gibt, die im Stehen nicht oder nicht gut an einer Tanztherapie teilnehmen können: ältere Menschen, Menschen mit neurologischen und neurodegenerativen Erkrankungen, Menschen mit chronischen Erkrank...
Article
Der Artikel gibt einen Überblick über den Stand der evidenzbasierten Wirkfaktorenforschung in den Künstlerischen Therapien, die neben Wirkungs- und kunstbasierter Forschung die 3. Forschungssäule darstellen. Sie fragt nach dem Wie?, der Funktionsweise, den Mechanismen. Der Artikel klärt Begriffe und Studienlage, führt in das Theoriemodell der verkö...
Article
Background Lifestyle‐based motor, sensory and cognitive enrichment can target several health risk factors in the older populations by improving psychosocial, cognitive and physical (dys)function 1,2 . Based on these findings, we developed a novel intervention called REMIND (An Envi r onmental E nrich m ent I ntervention to Preve n t D ementia) for...
Article
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Report about a symposium Tango in dance therapy and health care
Article
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Background: Lifestyle-based multimodal interventions that integrate physical, sensory, cognitive and social enrichment are suggested to promote healthy mental aging and resilience against aging and Alzheimer's disease (AD). Objectives: This meta-analysis examined the efficacy of dance movement interventions (DMI) as an integrated mind-body activ...
Article
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In a multicenter efficacy study 82 psychiatric and psychosomatic patients answered questions about the mechanism of action of dance movement therapy (DMT). It was hypothesized that there is (1) a positive effect of DMT on stress (measured with the visual analog scale, VAS), self-efficacy expectations (measured with the general self-efficacy short s...
Article
Künstlerische Therapien wie Kunst-, Musik- und Tanztherapie sind heute in vielen unterschiedlichen Indikationsbereichen von Rehabilitationskliniken und in Akutkliniken Teil eines integrativen, psychosozialen Angebots 1. Sie werden als therapeutische Leistungen von zumeist akademisch ausgebildeten Fachkräften mit Bachelor- und Master-Abschluss erbra...
Article
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Cognitive impairment in older adults is associated with poor gait performance, physical decline, falls and poor quality of life. This paper analyzes the feasibility and efficacy of tango-based intervention in older people living in nursing homes with and without cognitive impairment. A multicenter study, with pre- and post-test, was carried out. In...
Preprint
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Cognitive impairment in older adults is associated with poor gait performance, physical decline, falls and poor quality of life. This paper analyzes the feasibility and efficacy of a tango-based in-tervention in older people with cognitive impairment living in nursing homes. A multicenter study, with pre and post-test, was carried out. Intervention...
Preprint
Full-text available
Multimodal lifestyle-based interventions that integrate physical, mental and social stimulation could promote mental health and brain resilience against dementia. This meta-analysis examined the efficacy of dance movement interventions (DMI) on psychological health in older adults. Pre-registration was done with PROSPERO (CRD42021265112). PubMed, W...
Article
Application of Dance Movement Therapy to the corporate setting- how Dance Movement Therapy affects group communication in the workplace: a pilot study
Article
Full-text available
The social challenges in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) can present as qualitative differences in interactions that make individuals on the autism spectrum appear less engaged with others. Limited interactional synchrony and other nonverbal movement patterns may contribute to these qualitative differences. This article uses the case of Hans, an ad...
Article
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We propose Rhythmic Relating for autism: a system of supports for friends, therapists, parents, and educators; a system which aims to augment bidirectional communication and complement existing therapeutic approaches. We begin by summarizing the developmental significance of social timing and the social-motor-synchrony challenges observed in early...
Article
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Background: Individuals on the autism spectrum are often described as having atypical social interactions. Ideally, interactional synchrony helps any interaction flow smoothly with each individual responding verbally, non-verbally, and/or emotionally within a short timeframe. Differences in interactional synchrony may impact how individuals on the...
Article
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Empirical studies in the creative arts therapies (CATs; i.e., art therapy, dance/movement therapy, drama therapy, music therapy, psychodrama, and poetry/bibliotherapy) have grown rapidly in the last 10 years, documenting their positive impact on a wide range of psychological and physiological outcomes (e.g., stress, trauma, depression, anxiety, and...
Article
Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate what resources recent refugees to the USA tap into and how collaborative expressive movements were experienced with regard to coping and resourcing, and to derive a theoretical model that would inform the use of dance/movement therapy and other holistic treatment modalities with refugees. Design/...
Book
The concept of embodiment, or the lived experience of the body, has become an important focus of scholarly attention across psychology, sociology, philosophy, and cultural studies. Addressing the inherent challenges of researching the lived experience of the body, this edited volume brings together experienced scholars who conduct and teach embodie...
Preprint
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Zusammenfassung Dieser Artikel bietet eineÜbersicht zum Forschungsstand der Tanz-und Bewegungstherapie ("dance movement therapy", engl. Abk.: DMT) für Menschen mit einer Krebserkrankung. Tanz-und Bewegungstherapie ist eine Therapie an der Schnittstelle von Bewegung, Kunst und Psychotherapie. Als künstlerische Therapie adressiert sie neben den Wirkf...
Article
This article provides an overview of the state of research in dance and movement therapy (DMT) for people with cancer. Dance movement therapy is a therapy at the interface of movement, art, and psychotherapy. As a creative arts therapy it addresses aesthetic and holistic aspects (e.g. experience of beauty in movement, experience of body–mind unity)...
Article
Bodyfulness. On the Role of Somatic Attention as a Healing Element The article develops the concept of "bodyfulness" (Caldwell, 2018), denominating a contemplative, accepting, but also a creative and functional pleasure-related concept of one's own body and its movements, as an aspect often missing in our societies. The concept is fundamental for...
Article
There have been many infant researchers who have investigated issues of scholarly interest, but there has only been one Colwyn Trevarthen. This one Colwyn Trevarthen we want to essentially thank for his work with three small pieces of artwork derived from his thinking. We leave the discussion up to the reader.
Article
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Flamenco, the Spanish dance, is about expressing oneself with clarity, beauty, strength, pride, and self-confidence. Trauma survivors have often lost the ability to express themselves authentically, because they feel disconnected from themselves, or from life, often associate strength with violence, and can be flooded by strong emotions when moving...
Article
Full-text available
Flamenco, the Spanish dance, is about expressing oneself with clarity, beauty, strength, pride, and self-confidence. Trauma survivors have often lost the ability to express themselves authentically, because they feel disconnected from themselves, or from life, often associate strength with violence, and can be flooded by strong emotions when moving...
Article
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The effect of ongoing bombs and sirens in civilian areas and in day-to-day life, as is typical in current war situations, transforms the spaces of everyday living into traumatic spaces. Not only do the spaces hold memories of past traumas, but they are also stages for trauma that will occur in the near future. Thus, the most familiar “safe spaces”...
Article
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Der Artikel zeigt auf, wie das Leibgedächtnis definiert ist und es in der Demenz erhalten bleibt. Er stellt Bezüge zu Künstlerischen Therapien, insbesondere zur Tanztherapie, her und zeigt, wie in dieser Arbeit Fähigkeiten des intakten Leibgedächtnisses genutzt werden können, um positiven Affekt und kreative Ressourcen zu stimulieren. Auf der Leibe...
Book
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There is a growing interest in embodied approaches to psychotherapy internationally. This volume focuses on the respective focal professions of dance movement psychotherapy (DMP) and body psychotherapy (BP), addressing the psychotherapeutic need for healing throughout the lifespan. Within embodied clinical approaches, the therapist and client colla...
Poster
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Background. We have diagnosed and treated schizophrenia for over a century but have not come very far in alleviating its burden [see e.g. 1]. This may be due to a simple, but essential aspect, widely ignored in conventional diagnostics, treatment and research: the moving body [2]. Evidently, there is no mental illness that does not affect the (movi...
Article
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This study examines the effects of dance movement therapy (DMT) on empathy for adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). DMT based on the embodiment approach offers body-centered interventions, such as mirroring techniques, to address the needs of ASD patients. Accordingly, findings of a feasibility study suggest that DMT may be an effective appr...
Article
Background: Research on migration provides controversial findings regarding the links between mental health and migration as well as the factors influencing the mental health of migrants. Even though there is evidence for differences between migrant groups from different countries of origin, almost no empirical studies about individual migrant gro...
Article
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In the last two decades, there has been a growing interest in and popularity of Escrima – Philippian martial art of stick fighting - employed in a therapeutic way in the context of dance movement therapy (DMT). DMT employs Escrima techniques to work on the increase in experienced strength, resources, and self-confidence, clarity and the patient’s a...
Article
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Stress is one of the world's largest health problems, leading to exhaustion, burnout, anxiety, a weak immune system, or even organ damage. In Germany, stress-induced work absenteeism costs about 20 billion Euros per year. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Central Federal Association of the public Health Insurance Funds in Germany ascribes pa...
Article
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Creation is an important part of many interventions in creative arts therapies (art, music, dance, and drama therapy). This active part of art-making in arts therapies has not yet been closely investigated. The present study commits to this field of research using a mixed-methods design to investigate the effects of active creation on health-relate...
Article
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Kunsttherapie ermöglicht Palliativpatienten, sich in ihrer existenziell bedrohlichen Situation kreativ zu betätigen, nonverbal über Tod und das Sterben zu kommunizieren sowie sich von Schmerzen und Ängsten abzulenken. In diesem 2. Teil des Reviews wird der Erfahrungsstand zur Kunsttherapie in der Palliativversorgung zusammengefasst und ein Ausblick...
Book
Embodiment has become a major area of interest in many academic fields (e.g., phenomenology and cognitive sciences). Recently, this development has been extended to issues of aesthetic perception and performance: On the one hand, people bodily resonate with aesthetic objects when appreciating art; on the other hand, in art-making, people may experi...
Conference Paper
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Background: High expectations about acupuncture might contribute to larger treatment effects (Prady et al., 2015). However, problems in the assessment are well known: 1) floor or ceiling effects lower variance; 2) expectation measures include general beliefs about complementary medicine; 3) construct validity of expectation measures remains unclear...
Article
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Rhythmus ist zentrales Element von Tanz- und Bewegungstherapie und Musiktherapie, Übergänge zwischen Musik und Bewegung zeigen sich in beide Richtungen. Beide Therapieformen zeichnen sich durch einen hohen Körperbezug, ein dynamisches künstlerisches Medium und ihre überwiegend nonverbale Qualität aus. Auf senso¬motorischer Ebene kommt dem Rhythmus...
Poster
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The Poster gives a brief Overview of a Systematic Database Search about previous experiences and studies in Art Therapy in Palliative Care.
Article
Kunsttherapie (Therapie mit bildnerischen Medien) wird in der Palliativversorgung seit über 30 Jahren angeboten und im Rahmen der palliativen Komplexbehandlung (OPS 9–982) neben anderen begleitenden Therapiemaßnahmen empfohlen. Entgegen einer breiten praktischen Erfahrung ist ihre Wirkung bisher jedoch wissenschaftlich kaum untersucht. Auf Basis ei...
Article
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One of the frequently overlooked psychosocial problems of refugees is the phenomenon of homesickness. Being forced into exile and unable to return home may cause natural feelings of nostalgia but may also result in emotional, cognitive, behavioral and physical adversities. According to the literature, the creative arts therapies with their attentio...
Article
What works in dance movement therapy (DMT)? Does DMT affect the targeted health aspects? If so, how does it work? Which active factors can we identify? What exactly helps the clients? After a brief overview of efficacy studies in DMT, identifying for which patient groups DMT was already tested as an evidence-based therapy, we turn to the question o...
Article
The aim of the present study was to examine whether swing dancing increases the dancer's happiness, and if so, which active factors are responsible. We considered whether (1) swing dance causes an increase in subjective well-being, and (2) whether and which of the three active factors is responsible for the effect: swing music, the movement of "bou...
Article
Full-text available
Dance/movement therapy (DMT) is an academically young discipline with a need to identify effective movement interventions and active factors of dance related to health improvements. Non-goal-orientation is a defining aspect of improvisational dance, one of the most used dance forms in DMT sessions. Based on the phenomenological approach on the psyc...
Article
Full-text available
The treatment of deficits in social interaction, a shared symptom cluster in persons with schizophrenia (negative symptoms) and autism spectrum disorder (DSM-5 A-criterion), has so far remained widely unsuccessful in common approaches of psychotherapy. The alternative approach of embodiment brings to focus body-oriented intervention methods based o...
Chapter
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Tanz- und Bewegungstherapie ist der psychotherapeutische Einsatz von Tanz und Bewegung mit dem Ziel der Integration von körperlichen, emotionalen, kognitiven und sozialen Aspekten des Individuums (ADTA 2015; BTD 2015). Sie ist ein evidenzbasiertes Verfahren (vgl. Koch et al. 2014; Ritter und Low 1996) der künstlerischenTherapien (z. B.,Musik-, Kuns...
Article
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Background: Dance is an embodied activity with benefits for mobility, balance, and quality of life (QoL) of persons affected by Parkinson's Disease (PD). It is enjoyable and likely to support adherence to movement prescriptions. The objective of this study was to assess the feasibility of measuring changes in psychological outcomes, specifically we...
Article
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Mit seinem jüngsten Werk "Körperpsychotherapie" trägt Ulfried Geuter die Schätze aus nunmehr 100 Jahren Körperpsychotherapie zusammen. Dabei gelingt ihm die Vogelperspektive auf das vielgestaltige Netzwerk all jener Ansätze, die “Psychotherapie mit den Mitteln des Körpers und der Seele” ausgearbeitet haben. Sein beeindruckender Wissensschatz ermögl...
Article
Full-text available
Body image has rarely been investigated in Autism Spectrum Disorder. Recent advances in embodiment research on nonverbal improvements in Autism Spectrum Disorder have encouraged the investigation of this topic. In the context of the clinical study of autism and schizophrenia in the Heidelberg Node of the TESIS-network, we investigated the effects o...
Article
Full-text available
Embodiment is a hot topic in psychotherapy. While its principles seem ready to be applied to psychosomatic issues, they are currently at proof in the treatment of psychiatric diseases. Schizophrenia is an often chronic, severe mental illness and involves high suffering of the person affected. While medication can successfully address positive sympt...
Article
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Freiräume für das Schöne sind wichtig in der Palliativversorgung: die Erfahrung dessen, was jemand mitzuteilen hat oder hinterlassen möchte, das Loslassen dessen was nicht mehr festgehalten werden muss, oder das Abschließen dessen, was noch offen ist. Die künstlerischen Therapien (Kunst-, Musik-, Tanz-, Theater- und Poesietherapie) stellen solche F...
Article
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Objective: Negative symptoms of patients with Schizophrenia are resistant to medical treatment or conventional group therapy. Understanding schizophrenia as a form of disembodiment of the self, a number of scientists have argued that the approach of embodiment and associated embodied therapies, such as Dance and Movement Therapy (DMT) or Body Psych...
Article
Body image has rarely been investigated in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Recent advances in embodiment research on nonverbal improvements in ASD have encouraged the investigation of this topic. In the context of the clinical study on autism and schizophrenia in the Heidelberg Node of the TESIS-network, we investigated the effects of dance movemen...
Research
Full-text available
The chapter introduces interdisciplinary embodiment approaches from anthropology, linguistics, and psychology and relates them to creative arts therapies. It particularly focuses on the role of the body proper, body motion, basic dimensions of movement, body memory, and gender, fields that lie at the intersection of cognitive sciences and dance/mov...
Article
Creative arts therapies have long made use of the interconnection between body, emotion, and mind. Movement is intimately intertwined with emotional and cognitive functions, and role play promotes perspective taking, empathy, and interactive competencies. In this pilot study, with a pre-/post-test waiting-group design of male prison inmates in thre...
Article
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Introduction Dynamic systems theory and embodiment in psychotherapy research. A new look at process and outcome In an attempt to cease from reducing the world and its phenomena to linear modeling and analytic dissection, Dynamic Systems Theories (DST) and Embodiment theories and methods aim to account for the complex, dynamic, and non-linear phenom...