Collaborative partnerships in sport psychology applications of EMDR: High performance and trauma recovery

Clinicians who have grown to accept and support Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR) have begun to diversify the types of trauma populations in which EMDR is applied. Psychology of injury researchers have suggested, on the basis of their work, that an exciting new direction in sport psychology is the implementation and testing of new interventions aimed at modifying risk factors for athletes. It has also been suggested that extant models of athletic injury may reasonably be re-interpreted to account for other traumatic stressors, additional to injury, in sport. EMDR may reduce stress and trauma reactions in sport participants. EMDR, however, has been developed as a clinical tool and there are limitations on entrance to training in the approach. There are myriad ways, however, in which valuable partnerships may be formed, among psychologists, sport psychologists, and educational sport psychology consultants to use EMDR on behalf of clients. This symposium, within its five sections, will report on many such collaborations. The following are the objectives of the session: (a) provide a brief overview of the research and theory base for EMDR and its use in performance work; (b) describe case reports of successful partnerships among EMDR-trained sport psychologists and variably trained professionals from sport performance.

Conference

English

Carole Oglesby
Sandra "Sam" Foster
W. Sime
T. C. North
Jennifer Lendl

Oglesby, C., Foster, S., Sime, W., North, T. C., & Lendl, J. (1999). Collaborative partnerships in sport psychology applications of EMDR: High performance and trauma recovery. Symposium conducted at the annual conference of the Association of the Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology, Banff, AB