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The Kestenberg Movement Profile (KMP) |
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A psychotherapist listens to her patient and from the words and tone of voice develops psychologically informed interpretations. But what does a therapist do in the face of a nonverbal or barely verbal patient, such as an infant, small child or uncommunicative adult. In the 1950's, child psychoanalyst, Judith Kestenberg, sought to find a nonverbal modality from which to gain psychological insight without reliance on words.
Though often outside of our awareness, all people regularly rely on nonverbal cues to assess the feelings and personality traits of others. We each have our own informal lexicon of movement patterns that becomes an untaught, yet essential, reference guide, enabling us to respond and adjust to others. Freud (1905) pointed out that patients unconsciously reveal inner anxieties and feelings through body movements: “If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips, betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.” (P95). Psychologist A. Lowen went further suggesting that “even when a person tries to hide his true feelings by some artificial postural attitude, his body belies the post in the state of tension that is created. The body does not lie (Lowen 1971 p.100). The Rapper Jay-Z wrote that in wordless encounters, we watch body language to learn intentions of others, seeking life or death clues.
If the mind, emotions, and body are a closely integrated , mutually interacting system, then it is reasonable that we should be able to gain information about the mind by observing the body. The body and its manner of moving not only reveals aspects of current feelings and emotions, but can give us insight into an individual’s past. As Loman and Foley wrote in 1996, “...experiences get stored in the body and are reflected in body movement.” A person who feels rejected may develop a hollow, narrowed body attitude which expresses and reinforces such feelings throughout life. Because both physical and emotional experiences leave long term traces upon the way people hold themselves and move, the study of movement opens a door to the study of patterns of early development, coping strategies and personality configurations.
Can this level of understanding be transformed into a systematic and reliable methodology which would have far reaching applications? The Kestenberg Movement Profile (KMP) was designed to systematize the mind body links that we all use in our daily lives and based on long term observations, single out key movement qualities and patterns which have the
most psychological significance for describing, assessing and interpreting nonverbal behavior.
The profile which was developed after years of observation of children and adults by Judith Kestenberg and her colleagues (The Sands Point Study Group) was named the Kestenberg Movement Profile. Its structure and focus are based on the psychological profile developed by Anna Freud, with a strong emphasis on development. Its movement language is based on the Laban System of Movement Notation with modifications adaptive to its psychological focus (see a more detailed history below).
What does this mean in practice?
Using the KMP, an observer notates the frequencies of specified movement qualities of a mover. These qualities are organized into nine different categories (termed diagrams) which relate to qualities such as affects, needs and drives, coping mechanisms and self feelings (see the section labeled “KMP sample profile” for more detailed description or KMP literature. The data collected is then represented graphically in 8 diagrams. From these, the analyst can view a descriptive profile of the subject observed. The analyst can also develop hypotheses which will help guide a treatment or guidance plan.
The KMP’s information about intrapersonal psychological functioning is applicable to all age groups; some patterns may even be studied in the womb (Loman, 1992). Any two or more profiles (e.g., mother and child) can be compared with each other to yield information about areas of interpersonal conflict and harmony.
Those who are interested in specific question rather than a comprehensive profile, may collect data on just certain types of movement qualities, e.g. relating to learning styles, or responsiveness to stimuli in the environment or modes of interpersonal relationships.
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History: the development of the Kestenberg Movement Profile |
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Judith Kestenberg
As a young medical student in Vienna, Judith Kestenberg became intrigued by the impact of neurological damage on both cognitive patterns. Later in the United States as a child psychoanalyst she turned again to the body to better understand the mind. In the early 1950's there were few models for the study of nonverbal behavior. She floundered about trying to create her own method of movement notation until she was finally introduced to the work of Rudolph Laban and Warren Lamb (Laban & Lawrence, 1947: Laban, 1960) and Warren Lamb’s (1965) interpretation of their use and structure (Ramsden, 1973). By 1953, Kestenberg had begun longitudinal studies of the movement patterns of three children, who she followed for 20 years. From this work she began to see both persistent qualities and developmental patterns. Later, Kestenberg's investigations into the role of nonverbal behavior in treatment and assessment were pursued further within the collaborative context of the Sands Point Movement Study Group. Kestenberg made important clinical and theoretical contributions through her observation of infants, children and adults.
Warren Lamb, originator of Action Profile and Kestenberg Mentor
Rudolf Laban, Rudolf Laban dancing, and the Laban Effort Shape Diagram
The group realized that little concerning movement was known from a psychoanalytic perspective, and even less was standardized. Where should they begin? Beginning with Anna Freud’s psychodynamic profile (Freud 1965), they looked for movement qualities which were associated with the classic developmental phases, oral, anal, and phallic. Members of the Sands Point Study Group notated infants on neonatal units, as well as children in nursery schools and well-baby clinics. Judith also observed children on Israeli kibbutzim.
Irmgard Bartenieff
In 1972 in order to provide themselves with a research site as well as make contributions to primary prevention, the Group opened a Center for Parents and Children under the auspices of Child Development Research on Long Island. At this pre-school like program, mothers and fathers accompanied their children from birth through four years of age in a developmentally attuned program. At the Center, large numbers of KMP assessments were made (from live observation, film and video recordings) based on periodic movement observations of children and parents. The KMP assessments provided opportunities to apply and clarify the diagnostic usage of the KMP in relation to clinically-known adults and children.
As a result of these research the group discovered the existence of two more phases of development, urethral and inner-genital, amplifying the original Freudian model and demonstrating the basis of maternality and paternality of all children. By having both fathers and mothers attend the Center the group was able to discover and help parents build upon what was then called the feminine qualities in men and masculine qualities of women, which today we speak of in terms of inner and out-genital phases of development.
The KMP evolved during more than 30 years of research by Kestenberg and her colleagues (Kestenberg 1975, Kestenberg & Sossin, 1979, Kestenberg Amighi, Loman, Lewis, & Sossin, 1999). Their findings have linked the dominance of specific movement patterns with particular developmental phases and psychological functions. Movement observation has complemented Kestenberg's (1975, 1976, 1980a, 1980b) investigations of gender studies, pregnancy and maternal feelings, and of obsessive-compulsive disorder. The dominant focus of much of this research has been the development of techniques for the primary prevention of emotional disorders.
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