حرکت به سمت شواهد برای حرکت/رقص درمانی: رابین هود در گفت و گو با پادشاه

The myth of Robin Hood is used to explore the possible dynamics between arts therapies researchers, and in particular dance movement therapy researchers, and the world of science. As professions positioned in relation to science, arts therapists are in danger of splitting and denigration on the one hand, or appeasement on the other. The case is made for a new way forward that includes making use of what arts therapists do well in terms of creativity and embodied knowing, whilst reaching out into multidisciplinary and international research partnerships. The imperative to evidence arts therapies practice has never been more urgent. Three forms of evidence are explored: Randomised Controlled Trials and systematic reviews of these; process research; and practice-based evidence from more than one practitioner using a core data set of outcome measurement. A case study is offered to demonstrate how routine outcome measures can be used to gather evidence that links outcome to process.

Research in the arts therapies has developed considerably in the latter part of the 20th and early years of the 21st century. British research in dance movement therapy (DMT1) is still fairly sparse, with very little published compared to the USA. Part of this discrepancy may be due to the fact that the first British dance movement therapists to attempt research degrees did so at a time and in a setting that allowed for the development of qualitative research, before journal editors were ready to accept this as a valid approach. My own first attempt in the 1980s to publish qualitative research findings in an international journal was rejected, because the methodology did not meet the accepted standards at that time for “scientific” research; that is to say I was not using a quasi-experimental design. Since then, the same journal has published several articles concerned with qualitative research in the arts therapies, including some of my own.