Phenomenological physiotherapy: extending the concept of bodily intentionality

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F61989592%3A15210%2F22%3A73610315" target="_blank" >RIV/61989592:15210/22:73610315 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://mh.bmj.com/content/48/4/e14" target="_blank" >https://mh.bmj.com/content/48/4/e14</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2021-012300" target="_blank" >10.1136/medhum-2021-012300</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Phenomenological physiotherapy: extending the concept of bodily intentionality

Original language description

This study clarifies the need for a renewed account of the body in physiotherapy to fill sizable gaps between physiotherapeutic theory and practice. Physiotherapists are trained to approach bodily functioning from an objectivist perspective; however, their therapeutic interactions with patients are not limited to the provision of natural-scientific explanations. Physiotherapists’ practice corresponds well to theorization of the body as the bearer of original bodily intentionality, as outlined by Merleau-Ponty and elaborated upon by enactivists. We clarify how physiotherapeutic practice corroborates Merleau-Ponty’s critical arguments against objectivist interpretations of the body; particularly, his analyses demonstrate that norms of optimal corporeal functioning are highly individual and variable in time and thus do not directly depend on generic physiological structures. In practice, objectively measurable physical deviations rarely correspond to specific subjective difficulties and, similarly, patients’ reflective insights into their own motor deficiencies do not necessarily produce meaningful motor improvements. Physiotherapeutic procedures can be understood neither as mechanical manipulations of patients’ machine-like bodies by experts nor as a process of such manipulation by way of instructing patients’ explicit conscious awareness. Rather, physiotherapeutic practice and theory can benefit from the philosophical interpretation of motor disorders as modifications of bodily intentionality. Consequently, motor performances addressed in physiotherapy are interpreted as relational features of a living organism coupled with its environment, and motor disorders are approached as failures to optimally manage the motor requirements of a given situation owing to a relative loss of the capacity to structure one’s relation with their environment through motor action. Building on this, we argue that the process of physiotherapy is most effective when understood as a bodily interaction to guide patients toward discovering better ways of grasping a situation as meaningful through bodily postures and movements.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

—

OECD FORD branch

60301 - Philosophy, History and Philosophy of science and technology

Project

—

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Medical Humanities

ISSN

1468-215X

e-ISSN

1473-4265

Volume of the periodical

48

Issue of the periodical within the volume

4

Country of publishing house

GB - UNITED KINGDOM

Number of pages

14

Pages from-to

1-14

UT code for WoS article

000783017400001

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85141965404