Talk:Somatic experiencing/Archive 1

Archive 1

Reference list added

I have now added a Reference list to the Somatic Experiencing article, and believe that the warning: This article does not cite any references or sources, should be removed. For the same reason, the warning: This article or section may contain original research or unverified claims, should be removed. Somatic Experiencing is, with a 10-year old history in Denmark, a well-established, recognized therapeutic method for dealing with and alleviating the symptoms of PTSD. It's used by hundreds of therapists, and psychologists with a university education in both Denmark, the EU in general, in South America and in the USA. I believe that the wording of the article is in accordance with the facts. For example the sentence: Somatic Experiencing® is a form of therapy that can relieve the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, demonstrates the sober form of the article - there are no promises involved. My personal background for writing this is 42 years as a university-educated psychologist in Denmark. Jack Donen, cand.psych. Numus 18:16, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. The references should be cited within the article though, not just listed at the end. --Karuna8 19:12, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Good Lord, no! PLEASE! don't merge that mixed-up "review" of the book Waking the Tiger with the Somatic Experiencing article! The book review seems to have taken a few of the ideas in the book and makes them into its core. The review seems, right from the beginning, to have been written by literature, religion or philosophy buffs, not by people conversant with psychology and/or therapy. "The book's title alludes to the belief embraced by the author that resolving trauma will result in increased physical and psychological energy" - as an explanation of the title, that's rubbish. "The belief embraced by the author" - Levine is not a parish priest. And resolving trauma releases otherwise bound-up energy, of course. But it does a lot more, too. The tiger is a symbol of returning to a more natural, energetically freer state, but also a more "natural" emotionally and intellectually freer state. In fact traumatized people, relieved of their symptoms can relatively often experience a feeling of having become a more encompassing person, stronger, more self-assured and with better boundaries. One can talk about the development of personality, or having established a new personality, a new IDENTITY! These are the type of changes Levine describes, and which people who work with his methods, experience taking place in their clients. The review has, as I say, little to do with psychology, at best one could call it a loose beginning of a literary analysis - at worst, a subjective pick of a few randomly chosen ideas from the book, described with no sense of their psychological meaning. I could go on - truly! Remove it by all means. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Numus (talk • contribs) 20:18, 8 August 2007

• Disagree with Merging(Waking the Tiger with Somatic Experience)-Please don't merge. The article of book should be distinguished with this article.--Jondel 10:42, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Utilizing Polyvagal theory

Anyone want to help me address the connection between SE's Pendulation and Titration with Polyvagal Theory? Gheemaker (talk) 17:26, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Peter Levine biography article at risk of deletion; please help find sources for it and also for this article

If you can help locate sources for this article, or for the Peter Levine biography article, please do. Both articles need at least twice as many sources as they currently have. I'm attempted to recover the bio article from deletion, and it's now at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Karinpower/Peter_A._Levine - feel free to make changes/additions there. Thanks. --Karinpower (talk) 08:18, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

The bibliography is quiet bulky, often the year will go on the same line in bracket after the title. Jonpatterns (talk) 09:17, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree, that formatting is odd. I haven't delved into fixing it yet. Do you happen to know of an example of how it is usually done here on WP? Similarly the citation style in this article (SE) is odd, with the page numbers showing up right in the text. But if the page number is included in the citation, each separate set of pages will show up as an individual citation, which gets to be a mess. I'm hoping someone will know how best to fix it. Thanks for your comment.--Karinpower (talk) 05:10, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

Regarding citation page numbers, the rp template can be used after the ref tags. For example,

{{rp|17–18}} gives , see mellotron for an example where it is deployed.Jonpatterns (talk) 10:36, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

Jonpatterns, this is awesome. I'm just seeing this now, a year and half later! Glad to see it; I have had this dilemma so many times.--Karinpower (talk) 18:17, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Lede

User:Jytdog, I understand your concern about fake medicine. However, I believe this initial statement of the lede is stating what the aim of the method is, not claiming health benefit. The lede is meant to reflect the body, and the Conceptal Basis section discusses the nervous system. This seems to be the primary aim of this method, not specifically PTSD. --Karinpower (talk) 00:55, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

We cannot say that this technique actually effects the autonomous nervous system unless there are MEDRS sources that say so. Where are they? Jytdog (talk) 01:03, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

There's a big difference between saying what it aims to do and saying that is has MEDRS support. We do summarize what the goals of a method are... and PTSD isn't the primary goal. --Karinpower (talk) 01:04, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

That's fine, so say what it is, with reliable sourcing. We don't have to get into the muck of mechanism. Jytdog (talk) 01:09, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

OK, I believe we are in agreement? Of course it's a bit of process to figure out the right wording but I think we can tinker with it until it's more grounded and constrained to what can be appropriately stated without MEDRS.--Karinpower (talk) 01:11, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

Overcitation

What is going on with citations like this

Somatic Experiencing attempts to promote awareness and release physical tension that remains in the aftermath of trauma. This occurs when survival responses (which can take the form of orienting, fight, flight or "freeze") of the autonomic nervous system are aroused, but are not fully discharged after the traumatic situation has passed.[1]:92–97, 155–157, 158[4]:43–50[5]:38–40[6]:29–34[7]:273–277

? Material should be directly supported (per WP:V) by a strong source. Use of more than one or two sources raises a red flag that WP:OR or WP:SYNTHESIS is being used. This WP:OVERCITE issue looks problematic. Alexbrn (talk) 12:30, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

It looks like this got fixed? -Kieran (talk)

This is basically an advertisement for a book.

This is basically an advertisement for a book. If citations to peer-reviewed research is available, they are needed. Otherwise, it's hard to justify the continued existence of this article as it stands. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ocdcntx (talk • contribs) 16:08, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes this is a blatant violation of PSCI. so much garbage added to WP all the time. will list at FRINGEN. Jytdog (talk) 00:55, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

Part of it is a summary of SE ideas, but not an advertisement. It is clear throughout the article that the SE methods are discussed from the perspective of the theory, not as universal truth-claims. The quantity of peer-reviewed research is not the sole criterion for an article. Anyway, there is a lot of peer reviewed research. As far as "fringe" goes, it would be fringe if it were explicitly rejected by more mainstream scientists or clinicians, or clearly contradicted consensus views. This does not appear to be the case. Somatic experiencing is a small field, in that it has very few practitioners compared to, say, CBT or psychoanalysis. Small is not the same as fringe. I believe this article clearly merits inclusion in Wikipedia, and should not be considered "fringe." Acone (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:50, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

"Unbalanced"

I have removed the tag from 2013 claiming the article is unbalanced toward certain views. Maybe it was then, but it isn't now. The article still needs more sources, ideally from outside the SE community. But I see no opposing views being given short shrift. The article as it stands is a decent summary of SE methods, not advocacy for them or argumentation toward a particular viewpoint.Acone (talk) 23:56, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Jytdog (talk) 00:01, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Independent studies/citations

I'm slowly working on digging these out. It looks like there's a good round-up of the (admittedly limited) literature here. I think once those are incorporated, it'll be possible to remove the tags. -Kieran (talk) 22:31, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Please don't. Wikipedia is not a catalog and we don't list a bunch of individual studies, citing the primary sources. Instead we rely on secondary and tertiary sources. Jytdog (talk) 23:35, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Are there no review studies/metastudies? --Karinpower (talk) 04:37, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm honestly really confused -- I don't see anything in not a catalog that prohibits citing primary sources from the academic literature. In fact, if it did, a vast swathe of Wikipedia articles would need to be rewritten (including some rather large and comprehensive articles I have written on deep scientific topics). Regarding secondary sources, basically the only review was written by the founder of the method, which felt might be a little on the edge of violating NPOV. Anyway, I'm editing it back in, but am happy to take it out (and/or put it up in an RfC), if you can show my a policy that prohibits citing primary sources. -Kieran (talk) 03:19, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

We source content about health based on secondary sources, per [{WP:MEDRS]], which are ideally independent, secondary sources like literature reveiws. There are many, many reasons for this. Jytdog (talk) 04:33, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, leaving aside the very sarcastic accusations of edit warring from an editor with a long history of warnings and suspensions for edit warring, and the fact that you're quoting a policy at me that you literally authored yourself (about which I have some serious reservations), WP:MEDRS does indeed say that, briefly, in one sentence, buried about 2K words in, where WP:NOTCATALOG did not, so I'm going to leave this alone. -Kieran (talk) 19:20, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Noting results from scientific literature is wholly appropriate in such an article. It is not correct to call peer reviewed research "primary," given the criteria in WP:USEPRIMARY. Primary sources would include a self-published tract, transcripts from SE sessions, testimonials, excepts from SE promotional materials, etc. The paper Kieran linked to is a peer-reviewed article, and therefore secondary. It may, however, be considered a non-neutral source because it is written by Peter Levine himself. The studies cited therein are neutral and eligible for inclusion by the canonical standards on Wikipedia. The policies in not a catalog do not prohibit citing primary sources anyway. No one is proposing the article catalog anything. Kieran is proposing integrating more peer-reviewed research into the article. That is a good thing, and discouraging such an obvious improvement, as Jytdog does, stands to make Wikipedia strictly worse. Acone (talk) 23:38, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Please see WP:MEDDEF for the definition of "primary" and "secondary" with regard to sources about health. MEDRS has broad and deep consensus in the community. Jytdog (talk) 23:52, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Ah, I had not read that. Thanks. I'm not sure those standards are applicable to this article. SE straddles the boundary between psychotherapy and nonmedical wellness activities like massage, yoga, and pilates. While it was invented by a doctor and has seen some interest from clinical professionals, SE is not regulated by states as a clinical practice, and it is not covered by medical insurance in the US (or anywhere as far as I know). Basically, I think the article should end up looking more like the articles on yoga. Mostly, it should focus on its history and current practice. To the extent it describes SE's theory on its own terms, it should be clear that SE is not an established clinical practice. As long as that's clear, it seems like citation of sources that would be considered primary under WP:MEDDEF should be acceptable in this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Acone (talk • contribs) 00:13, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

You are welcome! If we are making health claims, that is the kind of sourcing needed.... doesn't matter what kind of health. It is hard to write well about topics like SE in Wikipedia - to describe the technique but not what it does or does not do, when we don't have good sources for affects and adverse effects. Jytdog (talk) 00:21, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Improvements needed

So, Somatic Experiencing is a pscyhotherpeutic modality with quite a bit of supporting evidence throughout counseling psychology supporting its efficacy in treating certain psychological injuries/illnesses, especially among the trauma specialty. It is a legitimate treatment for PTSD, has been practiced since the 1970's, and is an approved treatment for PTSD by the American Psychological Association and the VA. But the way this article reads, you would assume that it is in the same camp as 9/11 truthers or Homeopathy. In the first sentence, there is a link to "Alternate Medicine" when this is most certainly NOT an alternative medicine. This isn't the first time I stumbled upon legitimate treatments and/or counseling psychology terms that are treated as if they were UFO sightings. Somatic Experiencing is evidence-based psychotherapy. And, for many, it works. If I was looking into Somatic Experiencing, and this was the first thing I found, I would assume it is hogwash and move on - possibly to my detriment because Somatic Experiencing is not hogwash.

If Somatic Experiencing is considered alternative medicine, then what is the "traditional" treatment for PTSD? Medication? EMDR? CBT? ECT? What makes Somatic Experiencing an alternative therapy? EMDR and Somatic Experiencing are commonly administered in combination, and both have been shown to be quite effective. I am changing "alternative therapy" to "pscyhotheray" in the lede - because that is what is listed under EMDR. Do people realize that Somatic Experiencing is a talk therapy? Gstridsigne (talk) 04:11, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia is based on what we call reliable sources. Claims about health benefits for SE need to be sourced from a) recent high quality literature reviews or b) statements by major medical bodies (say a treatment guideline by the APA or the VA). If you are aware of such sources, please feel free to summarize them in the article. This would be a very good thing!

Please do not make any edits that are not supported by sources like the ones I just mentioned. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 05:58, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

@Gstridsigne and Jytdog: I have no comment about this article in particular, but I will note that historically there has been some overlap between psychotherapy and alternative medicine in the practice of some clinicians, notably Wilhelm Reich, one of the key historical figures in body psychotherapy. A search on Google Scholar for "Wilhelm Reich" + "somatic experiencing" returns a number of interesting connections between Reich and the subject of this article. One example is the following passage in the unpublished paper "Is Reich Still Relevant?: Self Regulation from Wilhelm Reich to Peter Levine" presented by Jacqueline A. Carleton at the 14th Annual Meeting of the Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration in 2008:

Perusing Peter Levine's doctoral dissertation, I noticed that he briefly noted (pp. 65–6) the significance of Wilhelm Reich's thought to the development of contemporary paradigms used in many somatic psychotherapies, chief among them, Somatic Experiencing. He specifically highlighted Reich's theory of energetic charge/discharge involving the autonomic nervous system. [...] I began to compare what Reich and his followers had written with what Peter Levine and Maggie Klein recently wrote about the treatment of infants in Trauma through a Child's Eyes. I found enormous similarities. But, what was speculative on the part of Reich was neuroscientifically-based and elaborated by Levine and Klein.

Gstridsigne rather presumptuously stated above that "Wikipedia is terrible with mental health" without presenting any examples beyond some complaints about this article; in the absence of any convincing evidence or argumentation, I conclude that this statement is unsupported. Wikipedia is a collection of articles of varying quality; some articles are very good and many articles are very bad. Fortunately, anyone can edit Wikipedia, so if you notice that a particular article is bad and you do nothing to help improve it, then you are partly responsible for the quality of the article since you noticed that there was a problem and you did nothing to correct it. This is one of the revolutionary aspects of Wikipedia. Biogeographist (talk) 13:00, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

It's not presumptuous. Every time I fall upon an article concerning mental health, there is unprecedented amounts of criticism not afforded to other treatments. EMDR sees the same where the article focuses on the few articles that say it isn't effective, and ignores the journals that have shown time and time again that it is effective. Mental health terms like "body memory," which is a non-controversial term in mental health describing the perceived body sensations occurring during a flashback is somehow misconstrued and linked to a separate phenomenon purported by some quack who believes that non-nervous cells can hold memories too - which is not the prevailing definition of "body memory." And whenever someone points out the slanted point of view of articles depicting most mental health treatments as pseudoscience, a cadre of cretins come through. It is really actually disgusting, how legitimate mental health treatments are portrayed on wikipedia. I wish there was something I can do, but the people who think mental health treatments are pseudoscience seem to permeate wikipedia and no where else in real life. Gstridsigne (talk) 15:26, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

We get it, that you are passionate about this, and you want WP's content to be improved. You need to stop posting general stuff here, and focus on the content in the SE article. That is what this talk page is for. If you cannot restrain yourself and use this page appropriately, your posts will be removed. Please read the talk page guidelines.

I'd like to help meet your goals. The most important thing in WP, is strong sources. The two sources you used in this diff series, PMID 28680540 and PMID 28585761 are primary sources here in WP, not secondary sources. It is not OK to use primary sources this way.

Would you please cite here, the secondary sources you would like to summarize in the article, in order to improve it? (See WP:MEDDEF for more discussion of these defintions if you like) Jytdog (talk) 16:19, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Okay, I reviewed the distinction between primary and secondary sources - and both of the articles I listed are peer-reviewed which should meet the criteria for secondary sources. Neither of them were reviewed or authored by Peter Levine himself. Perhaps I am mistaken, but why is it not considered secondary or reliable? Both journals are peer-reviewed. Gstridsigne (talk) 19:38, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Honestly, if you were to remove the implications that SE is pseudoscience, and call it a psychotherapy instead of an alternative therapy, I would be happy. Changing one term would indeed remedy my issue with the entire article. Otherwise, the article is fine. But, I know you won't do that. So, there is not use in continuing. But if the bar is "World Health Organization deems Somatic Experiencing is the only effective treatment for PTSD and related disorders" then it is futile. All literature supports that Somatic Experiencing is effective in reducing symptoms of PTSD. It is a specialized treatment option, unlike CBT which is more generalized. Gstridsigne (talk) 17:36, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

The official SE website, somaticexperiencing.com, doesn't call SE "psychotherapy" anywhere, to my knowledge. That doesn't mean that it's not psychotherapy, but the website avoids calling it psychotherapy for whatever reason. However, the page about SE's creator Peter Levine mentions that "Levine's original contribution to the field of Body-Psychotherapy was honored in 2010 when he received the Life Time Achievement award from the United States Association for Body Psychotherapy (USABP)", so calling it a form of body psychotherapy may be appropriate. Some secondary sources call SE "body psychotherapy"; for example, there is a very brief mention in Michael Heller's book Body Psychotherapy: History, Concepts, and Methods (2012), page 485: "This heritage circulated in the schools of body psychotherapy like Biodynamic psychology, Psycho-Organic analysis, the Biodynamic school and Somatic experiencing. These do not always know that what they inherited from Brattøy and Bülow-Hansen had first of all been formulated by Fenichel, whom they generally have not read." Biogeographist (talk) 18:14, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

I would be completely fine with calling it "body psychotherapy." Actually, I think anything would be better than "alternative therapy." Gstridsigne (talk) 19:45, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Do you agree that "Somatic experiencing is a form of body psychotherapy" is an acceptable start to the article, as opposed to the current start which reads: "Somatic experiencing is a form of alternative therapy"? Biogeographist (talk) 21:35, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Merge proposal

Should this be merged to Somatic psychology? Jytdog (talk) 18:44, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

After reading that page, possibly. A practitioner of Somatic Experiencing asks the patient to relay an incidence - could be traumatic, distressing, annoying, or even mundane. Then the practitioner asks something like "What emotion do you notice when you recall this experience?" After the patient gives an answer like "I feel angry," the practitioner responds with "And how do you know you are angry?" In the first few sessions, this is pretty jarring for patients - most patients have never even considered this question. They ask "why," "who," or "what" made them angry, but never "how they know" they are angry. And within the first few responses, it becomes very apparent that the "how" we know we are feeling an emotion is because of our somatic sensations - "I know I'm happy because my stomach feels light." "I know I'm angry because I feel the tension in my jaw." "I know I'm sad because I feel my face drooping." The sensations are not the same for everyone - they are subjective, obviously. But after the sensation is revealed, the practitioner asks the patient to focus on the sensation and detail what changes to the sensation they experience over a short period of time. In this moment, it teaches the patient that they have control over their emotions - they can effect change to their emotional state just by focusing on it. It is quite often extremely relieving for the patient to realize that their emotions do not control them - the patient has much more control than originally thought. And if the patient has a somatic conversion of PTSD - headaches, nausea, back pain, high blood pressure etc. - they can effect change in the same way. Not once does the practitioner touch the patient, nor are the patients asked to perform physical acts. Just notice the sensations in the body. So - some of the somatic therapies require changing body positions or touching - this one typically does not. And the reason that it is regarded as an effective therapy for PTSD is because it can work much more quickly than other modalities like CBT which aren't addressing the somatic sensations. In PTSD, dissociation is common. It is nearly impossible to do therapy on a person who is dissociating - they begin relaying their trauma narrative and it is like they are talking roboticly or about someone else, if they do not just zone out altogether. Somatic therapeutic models like somatic experiencing, EMDR, grounding therapy, or the new brainspotting techniques help with preventing dissociation - the techniques orient the patient to their body. Much of this is discussed in somatic psychology, not all, but somatic experiencing is just one technique among many. One technique/approach/modality/treatment is not going to work for everyone, but somatic experiencing has quite a bit of evidence supporting its efficacy. Gstridsigne (talk) 19:21, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

The first half of Gstridsigne's paragraph above, describing SE technique, sounds a lot like focusing, although focusing is not a treatment for PTSD. The article on focusing may be one counterexample to Gstridsigne's perception that articles about mental health treatments receive unprecedented amounts of criticism. There's no criticism at all of focusing (yet). Biogeographist (talk) 19:38, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Focusing sounds nothing like what I described. Focusing seems to rely on concepts that cannot be expressed in words. Somatic Experiencing relies on describing the physical sensations that an emotion elicits. I see no parallels between the two techniques. And it actually verified that mental health pages receive undeserved amounts of criticism. Gstridsigne (talk) 19:42, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

I see the difference in emphasis between the two now, thanks. But the talk page section to which you linked does not "verify" that mental health pages receive "undeserved" amounts of criticism. The first comment in that linked section merely described someone's perception that the page was "unbalanced promotion" of the article subject (very similarly to how you described above your perception that this article is unbalanced disparagement of its subject), and did not lead to any edits of the article. Even when I suggested, in the talk page section to which you linked, that a "Criticism" section could remedy any deficits, nobody took up my suggestion. That is not an example of "undeserved" criticism in an article; it's an example of absence of any criticism, deserved or undeserved. Biogeographist (talk) 20:19, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

I guess what reminded me of focusing in your paragraph above was the phrase they can effect change to their emotional state just by focusing on it, which is also a principle of focusing. Sorry about the digression. Biogeographist (talk) 20:36, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Regarding the question of merging this article to Somatic psychology, I would ask whether that article or Body psychotherapy would be the appropriate destination. The article on somatic psychology makes contradictory statements about the relation of somatic psychology to body psychotherapy: a sentence in the first paragraph says that body psychotherapy "is a general branch of" somatic psychology, but a sentence in the second paragraph says that body psychotherapy "is often known" as somatic psychology "in the USA and Australia" (which suggests that Body psychotherapy and Somatic psychology should themselves be merged). I do not know the literature well enough to say which of these claims is most accurate. Biogeographist (talk) 21:35, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes they should probably all three be merged together. This kind of forking under alt names happens pretty often under psych topics. The question is which one to merge the other two into? Will do some digging into the literature and which page is oldest here, etc... Jytdog (talk) 21:41, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

So here in Wikipedia:

Here is the oldest version of this page, dated 6 August 2005.

Here is the oldest version of Body Psychology, dated 16 November 2005.

Here is the oldest version of Somatic Psychology, dated 31 August 2006.

and looking at editing stats

This page is 4,548 bytes, has had 185 Edits made by 75 editors, and 41 watchers. It has been viewed 9,392 times in the last 60 days.

Body Psychology is 14,747 bytes, has had 276 edits, made by 128 editors, has 37 watchers, and has been viewed 3,623 times in the last 60 days.

Somatic Psychology is 8,870 bytes, has had 251 edits made by 107 editors, and 41 watchers. It has been viewed 3,700 times in the last 60 days.

So Body Psychology has been the most lavished by the editing community, for sure. That might be the best target...The difference in page views is remarkable. Will see what the literature says later. Jytdog (talk) 23:58, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

The difference in page views among these three articles does not look so remarkable when compared to Psychotherapy. From April 2017 to April 2018, the monthly average of page views was 44,052 for Psychotherapy, 4,626 for Somatic experiencing, 2,147 for Somatic psychology, 1,797 for Body psychotherapy. Biogeographist (talk) 11:12, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Removed extraneous information from 'Theory & Methods'

Removed the following:

After reportedly having a "profound" dream Peter Levine believed he had been "assigned" the task "to protect this ancient knowledge from the Celtic Stone Age temples, and the Tibetan tradition, and to bring it to the scientific Western way of looking at things....". Levine also credits a vision in a dream to how he came up with the healing vortex concept originally, despite it being part of his mentors model and originated with Ahsen's bipolarity concept. He also boasts of year long mystical conversations with an "apparition" of Albert Einstein to his "synchronistic awakening" in developing his model. According to Levine, this synchronistic leading began in his mothers womb, where at a "moment of life threat" he "bonded with Einstein through her placental fetal "blood web."

None of this has anything to do with theory and method. I concede that this is very eccentric behaviour on Levine's part, but these are the strangest parts of an otherwise staid interview. And they've been selectively extracted to paint Levine in a negative light. The interview from which they came had much discussion about actual theory & method, but none of this was cited. Levine has written at length about the theory and methods underpinning Somatic Experiencing in his books, and it's beyond doubt that his work is grounded in scientific theory - even if those books are not admissible here.

This section reads much more cleanly for these edits. Discussions about Levine's 'inspiration' should be relegated to a personal biographical page. This page is about the treatment modality he originated, not his eccentricities as an individual. Critique should be limited to critique of theory and method - the critique of the polyvagal theory, for example, is reasonable.

I also removed the following:

One of the Somatic Experiencing Institutes board of directors expressed that he "really needed a license" in a mental health discipline to practice Somatic Experiencing.[9] [...] The originator, who does not hold a clinical mental health license, has acknowledged that psychologists and psychiatrists believed he “needs to be stopped" because his "teaching is dangerous."[11]

Both of these quotes are completely out of context. The first was taken from an interview with a counsellor who talked about how experiencing the therapy as a patient motivated him to become a counsellor - part of which involves obtaining a license.

For Ocampo, the experience of this therapy was transformative. It gave him back his life in a real way. So in the aftermath of that, he joined professional training in the field. And ultimately, he decided that to bring this work to best benefit other people he needed to become a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. As he explains, “I really needed a license to become a practitioner, to practice this beautiful work.”

So he enrolled in the MA in Clinical Psychology at Antioch Los Angeles, with a specialization in Spiritual and Depth Psychology. This specialization allowed him to explore mindfulness-based therapy, Jungian analytic psychology, socio-cultural diversity consciousness—and the places where they intersected. He loved how depth psychology allowed the therapeutic space to become very spiritual as well. “What I mean by that,” he explains, is that “there’s a lot of depth, there’s a lot of realization, there’s a sense of arriving in oneself.”

The second quote is again, out of context and designed to mislead. Levine is, in the interview, reflecting on how he was received by psychologists and psychiatrists some 40+ years ago, when somatic based therapies were received with open hostility. He did not 'acknowledge' their critique, nor agree with it. He was merely reflecting on the intensity of the reaction that some had to his work in much earlier times.

There is no reference cited for the claim that Levine has no clinical mental health license. He does have a PhD in Psychology, according to his CV - and if he's no longer actively treating patients, then it's not clear that this is relevant. Orsova50 (talk) 11:54, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Orsova50 clearly states that he removed content because he wished to not portray Peter Levine in a negative light. I did not think Wikipedia was a platform for providing sanitized content of a method or an individual or to help market and promote their method. If, as Orsova50 says, the secondary sourced material from a peer reviewed journal does indeed put Levine in a bad light, why is that? Is it because Levine himself put himself in a bad light by claiming mystical inspiration for material that was clearly taken from his predecessors and mentors in the field? Levine, by his own testimony, developed his theories and methods through a socratic method of year long conversations with an apparition of Albert Einstein.

Should wikipedia sheild someone from what puts them in a bad light. The quotes were accurate and, in my opinion, do not look any better in context of the rest of the story. Some people may be attracted to SE because of the mysticism imbued nto the theory and methods by the founder.

In my opinion Peter Levine should have given homage and credit for his theoretical concepts to actual theories and actual researchers in the field who rather than attribute it to hissmystucal connections to brilliant spirits or ancient knowledge. The quote removed can be effective marketing with those drawn by Levine's shamanic influences.

Yes. It is hard to find any secondary sourced material to use to discuss the Somatic Experiencing method and that interview is definitely a secondary source from a peer reviewed journal. As far as Orsova50's claim that the rest of the interview article is otherwise staid, it is not.

Levine also claims he has practiced the method since 1968. . . 45 plus years. Is it true, or is there more evidence to show that he was practicing mind/body techniques of his predecessors? The USPO states that Somatic Experiencing was trademarked in 1989 and its first commercial appearance was 1985. That is 30-35 years. Levine also claims that he founded Ergos Institute (divining the name from a dream) in the early 1970's despite the verifiable fact that the corporation was founded/established in 1994, the year after his mentor Dick Olney passed away. These documented facts were also deleted by Wikipedia because they were not secondary sources. That seems odd that a verifiable government record (a primary source) cannot be used to counter secondary sources repeating unfounded claims by the founder. Prior to trademarking Somatic Experiencing in 1989 Peter Levine was teaching Dick Olney's Self Acceptance training. Olney gave credit to his predecessors not to dreams.

Wikipedia is not the place to blindly claim that Peter Levine began Somatic Experiencing 45 years ago, or founded Ergos instutite in the early 1970s just because it appears on his embellished resume. Wikipedia is not about making someone look good necessarily. It is about compiling secondary sourced materials on a topic. I am sorry if you feel that it puts Peter Levine in a bad light, but there is so much that puts Peter Levine in a bad light if one scratches the surface of self proclamations and shameless unfounded marketing claims. As for Peter Levine having no mental health license, an academic degree in psychology(self directed phd) is not a license to practice psychology in any state. Levine is registered as an "unlicensed psychotherapist" in the state of Colorado and hold no license at all in the state of California where he conducts most of his sessions treating PTSD. Colorado is one of the only states to allow for unlicensed registration of individuals who do not hold a clinical license. California allows for alternative practitioners but prohibits them from treating mental disorders. How does Doctor Levine practice this method legally? The quote that he holds no clinical license is relevant to the fact that Somatic Expereincing Practitioners appear to beleive they can practice, like the founder, without a license. Is SE a psychotherapy method that includes body awareness or is it a body based method exempt from psychotherapy licensing? This is germane to the "theory" topic. This is germane to "what is Somatic Experiencing?". This is germane to the fact that psychologists found his teaching dangerous.

If Levine's theories are founded on shamanism, a practice that is akin to religion and not science, what is relevant to include in the theory section? What is the "theory" of shamanism and what are its methods? "Shamanism is based on the premise that the visible world is pervaded by invisible forces or spirits which affect the lives of the living. Although the causes of disease lie in the spiritual realm, inspired by malicious spirits, both spiritual and physical methods are used to heal." (Wikipedia). If Somatic Experiencing is grounded in shamanic theory and methods (in part) and he ascribes mystical influences, dreams, and being bonded with the spirit of Einstein, isn't it relevant to include such "theories" and "methods" derived from such msytical forces in a write up of the method. Levine cannot have it both ways. He cannot imbue it with ancient and mystical forces AND have it be purely a scientific method and wikipedia doesn't get to sanitize the theory down to the ones that sound scientific and legitimate when Somatic Experiencing was founded on principles of both.

Maybe Orsova50 should not remove the quote because it makes Peter Levine look bad, but rather provide additional content from the article that he believes cushions the inclusion of the tarnishing information. As far as the Ocampo quote being out of context, it is not. It adds to the idea that although the SE method is taught to all sorts of practitioners, even a board member of the SEI organization believes it needs a license to be practiced. While the facts and quotes included might need to be tweaked to read more clear, concise and to clarify their contextual relevance, I believe they are very appropriate for this article. We are not here to make Peter Levine look good. His theory is founded on shamanic principles and the fact that he had mystical conversations with Einstein for a whole year, engaging in a socratic exercise with his spirit, while supposedly coming up with his theories and methods seems to me quite relevant. Vanguard666 (talk) 20:28, 13 August

References

Avatar 317 incorrectly removed secondary sourced material.

To quote wikipedia policy: "Biomedical information must be based on reliable, third-party published secondary sources, and must accurately reflect current knowledge. This guideline supports the general sourcing policy with specific attention to what is appropriate for medical content in any Wikipedia article, including those on alternative medicine. Sourcing for all other types of content – including non-medical information in medicine-articles – is covered by the general guideline on identifying reliable sources."

Avatar317 isunder the impression that all citations need to meet medical standards for biomedical sources rather than general guidelines which apply to other fields including psychotherapy. The page is flanked by the request to supplement this article with more biomedical sources NOT to expunge all properly cited secondary source material. == Since somatic experiencing is considered a somatic psychotherapy approach, much of the citations needed are from normal secondary sourced materials. This page only needs medical citations for physiological or medical claims NOT for rudimentary theoretical underpinnings. Avatar317 habitually removes properly secondary sourced material from one of the major publishers of somatic psychotherapy and somatics, North Atlantic Books. Their reason for removing such content is that North Atlantic Books is not a publisher of medical information. It doesn't need to be unless it pertains to biomedical information. Ahsen's principle of bipolarity, as one example, is a psychotherapy based theoretical concept and the general guidelines should apply. If I make a claim that the bipolarity principle leads to decreased autonomic arousal, I should be required to support that with sources that are credible and sufficiently scientific. Vanguard666 (talk) 14:02, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

That's a pretty common misunderstanding with psych articles. Claims about psychotherapy generally do need to meet medical standards because they are a form of healthcare which is used by physicians, e.g. psychiatrists, to treat medical concerns. This article is about a treatment of a medical disorder, so it does fall under WP:MEDRS. An example of non-medical information would be who the creator is, whereas the basis of a psychotherapy's effect is a medical claim. If its a claim about what a particular person believes the effect to be, that isn't a medical claim and can just meet the general guideline - in that case, the medical consensus about that person's opinion should also be explained (and appropriately sourced) or it can lead to issues around WP:UNDUE. I hope that helps to clarify the policy. --Xurizuri (talk) 07:17, 12 October 2021 (UTC)

Proposed merge: Peter A. Levine → Somatic experiencing

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

This has been posted at WP:RFCL and as requested I am here to close. There is a very clear consensus that Peter A. Levine should not have a standalone article. The only actual point in dispute here is whether to merge or redirect. That being said, this appears to be a semantic point. Most of the editors who have !voted for a merge acknowledge that Peter A. Levine is bereft of legitimate content and seek to merge and the only person who hasn't changed their merge !vote describes the worthwhile parts of the other page as being composed of "(scant) biographical content". I'll close as redirect Peter A. Levine to Somatic experiencing for now. If the lone merge !voter actually wants to include parts of that article in this article then we can describe this ex post facto as a merge, but unless that actually happens it makes more sense to describe the consensus here as being in favour of redirecting. Chess (talk) (please use {{reply to|Chess}} on reply) 18:09, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

---

It doesn't look like Peter A. Levine is notable for a standalone article; suitable content should be merged to Somatic experiencing. ––FormalDude talk 08:50, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

• why levine is not notable for a standalone article, but Gabor Maté already? I do not understand. a specialist should take a look next to meSchutz67 (talk) 17:30, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
  • Schutz, we're deciding notability based off of WP:GNG, WP:ANYBIO and WP:NACADEMIC. Just to clarify, notable doesn't mean the same thing on Wikipedia as it does in the rest of the world. Someone can be a beloved hero in their community but not have a wikipedia article; it's actually the norm. The premise here is that for a lot of people, they will be more interested in what Levine created than in the details of his life. That's not a reflection on him, it's just the nature of contributing something to the world. We also tend not to prefer to use the guidelines when figuring out notability, rather than comparing to other articles. --Xurizuri (talk) 05:42, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
• Merge. I agree, it looks like he's not notable by any of WP:GNG, WP:ANYBIO, or WP:NACADEMIC. And all of the vaguely interesting content is about somatic experiencing, so it would be most useful to a reader to merge the articles. --Xurizuri (talk) 07:47, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
• Merge The (scant) biographical content would make more sense here per WP:NOPAGE. Alexbrn (talk) 07:55, 27 October 2021 (UTC)
• I agree that discussing Peter Levine here would be appropriate. He is virtually synonymous with Somatic Experiencing.Vanguard666 (talk) 01:08, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
• peter levine has worked for decades to develop Somatic experiencing SE. he created it. people want a short info about the person, not info about his method and somewhere in-between an info about him. it would take to much time reading. SE is only one click away.
  To place the page peter levine under somatic expricing would be like placing the page albert einstein under the theory of relativity. people come across the name peter levine and want to read who he is. forwarding them to SE would confuse people. not everyone who is interested in peter levine is automatically also interested in SESchutz67 (talk) 08:22, 30 October 2021 (UTC) Note to closer: Schutz67 is the creator of the page that is the subject of this discussion.
  • I don't think Einstein and Peter Levine are comparable figures for a biographical POV. Alexbrn (talk) 10:42, 30 October 2021 (UTC)
    • I haven't compared Einstein and Peter Levine as figures for a biographical POV. Levine's influence and effect in the field of trauma therapy are already outstanding. what will it look like in 100 years, do you think you know?Schutz67 (talk) 17:30, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
      • WP:NOTCRYSTALBALL. Alexbrn (talk) 17:46, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
• Redirect, do not merge. The content is probably copyvio, and definitely unencyclopedic in tone. XOR'easter (talk) 20:36, 31 October 2021 (UTC)
  • @XOR'easter: My proposal is to only merge the suitable content, which, in my opinion, is basically just his occupation. ––FormalDude talk 06:19, 1 November 2021 (UTC)
    • Somatic experiencing already mentions his occupation ("trauma therapist"). What else is there to add? XOR'easter (talk) 13:13, 1 November 2021 (UTC)
• Redirect only - I'm changing my support since I agree with XOR'easter that there's essentially nothing suitable to merge. Pinging participants @Alexbrn and @Xurizuri to see if they may change their vote in order to reach consensus. ––FormalDude talk 01:39, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
  • I do not understand. a specialist in Therapy should take a look next to meSchutz67 (talk) 17:35, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
• Changing opinion to redirect. Everything worth keeping from the Levine article (i.e. he developed SE) is already in the SE article, so I'm happy with that.--Xurizuri (talk) 05:11, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
• Redirect. Not that this confers any special authority or status, but I wrote the first draft of the Somatic Experiencing article, and the author of the Peter Levine page contacted me and we agreed that the pages should be merged, but neither of us did the work to make that happen. FYI. I also agree at this point that a redirect is the most appropriate thing. Having just reread the Somatic Experiencing page, it seems to me that it currently fails the NPOV test and perhaps the Original research test. IMHO it's very argumentative and derogatory. Lcuff (talk) 16:37, 5 November 2021 (UTC)
  • This is WP:FRINGE/woo isn't it? Looks like it's being touted without any decent research ever having been done. Alexbrn (talk) 05:26, 6 November 2021 (UTC)

Notified: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Alternative medicine, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Psychology, Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Psychiatry task force, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine/Psychiatry task force, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Skepticism. ––Formal ^talk 04:15, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.