The CERAP and its SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS
Introduction to the laboratory and its research area, by Danis Bois, CERAP director
Created in June 2004 at the Modern University in Lisbon, the Centre for Applied Research and Studies in Perceptual Psychoeducation (CERAP = Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Appliquées en Psychopédagogie perceptive), is now affiliated to the Fernando Pessoa University of Porto.
For the most part, students enrolling in our training programs are healthcare professionals who focus their therapeutic and educational processes on the body and on sensory perception. Our students also include educators from the ‘living arts’ and communication fields. It is for this reason that we have quite naturally chosen to base our research projects on formalizing a framework for learning that is centered on the perceptual-cognitive mode of relating of the learner.
The model we offer is perceptual-cognitive modifiability (Bois, 2005) which sits within the academic discipline of “Health Science and Education”. The choice of this theoretical model fits with the advances of theories in the fields of education and healthcare, which we treat as inseparable.The originality of our training practice resides in supporting the emergence of an immanent meaning arising from a specific mode of relating to the ‘sensible’ experience of the body. Research in lived experience is by nature both subjective and deeply engaging, and therefore requires that the researcher adopts a posture which takes these characteristics into account. When faced with the link between embodied experience and the potential existential transformation of the learning adult, only the most rigorous posture can allow the development of a valid process of understanding and interpretation. Our approach therefore brings a new contribution to the debate between formative practices and therapeutic practices. It is an epistemological posture inspired by phenomenology and hermeneutics that allows researchers to participate in their own process of research.
This process is not achieved naturally; it requires specific support methodologies to help the person gain access to an authentic verbal and gestural expression through an out-of-the-ordinary bodily experience, establish a renewed relationship to self through the body and connect with immanent knowledge. The teaching framework what we propose during our training courses is based on the facilitation of out-of-everyday practices (Bois, 2005) which use touch, movement and sensorial introspection. Another component is the analysis of the practical sessions and their experiential content based on the information collected during body-centered verbal dialogue. Analyses of these details are used to assess the subjects’ ability to mobilize resources that could be related to what Gardner calls bodily kinaesthetic intelligence, intrapersonal intelligence and interpersonal intelligence (Gardner, 1983/1997). What is more, they show that it is possible to educate what we have chosen to name sensorial intelligence. (Bois, 2001). The main objective of our current work is to formalize the precise definition of this particular form of perceptual-cognitive resourcefulness and to identify the prerequisites for its emergence and development.
With either an educating or healing intent, we use in our approach a specific type of verbal dialogue centered on the body and on the ‘sensible’ (Bois 2005), because it affords the person who is experiencing a bodily event the opportunity for first-person verbal expression. It is on the basis of this embodied lived experience that the person is invited to unfold his/her reflection to gain an understanding of the meanings emerging from his/her experience. It is interesting to note that this type of therapeutic dialogue can also be used as a research interview when it is done with the objective of gathering, classifying and analysing data within the context of a research project. This illustrates how closely practice and research are linked in our approach. Our perceptual-cognitive and cognitive-behavioral enrichment programs go beyond developing potentiality in the context of adult experiential learning: we bring the practitioner to move from the posture of therapist to that of a reflective practitioner and of a researcher-practitioner. This explains the multiplicity of approaches assumed in the research publications that are posted on this website.
1. constructing the conditions for a self-referenced existential process of understanding,
2. providing a framework for the acquisition of a range of procedural know-how for professionals interested in bringing somatic education into their work,
3. allowing the development of a practical and theoretical expertise aimed at supporting a person in a process of transformation using somatic-psychoeducation,
4. devising qualitative assessment procedures in the context of the current research, specifically with regards to research relating to the emergence of immanent knowledge by means of a particular relationship to the body.
Within this site, my colleagues and I wish to create a focus for reflection and to allow the exchange of points of view on the role of the ‘sensible’ body in educational as well as in formative and existential learning processes.
Download do artigo (PDF - French version)
Research team
CERAP coordinators
Prof. Danis Bois : CERAP Director
Professor at Fernando Pessoa University
biographical note
Prof. Dr. Marc Humpich : Joint CERAP Coordinator
Professor at Fernando Pessoa University
Lecturer of Psychosociology at the University of Quebec at Rimouski
Prof. Dr. Maria Leão : Joint CERAP Coordinator
Professor at Fernando Pessoa University
Researchers
Corinne Arni
Post-graduate diploma in Perceptual Psychoeducation at the UML
Dr. Didier Austry
Doctor in sciences and Visiting Professor oat Fernando Pessoa University
Eve Berger
Visiting Professor at Fernando Pessoa University, PhD student in Education Sciences at the Laboratoire Experice, Université Paris VIII, psychomotricity practitioner
Hélène Bourhis
Visiting Professor at Fernando Pessoa University, Curative Psychoeducator
Christian Courraud
Visiting Professor at Fernando Pessoa University, Curative Psychoeducator
Emmanuelle Duprat
Psychiatrist, Post-graduate diploma in Perceptual Movement Education at the UML
Agnès Noël
Post-graduate diploma in Perceptual Psychoeducation
Nadine Quéré
Visiting Professor at Fernando Pessoa University, Curative Psychoeducator
Jeanne Marie Rugira, Ph.D.
Ph.D. Professor of Psychosociology in the Departement of Human Sciences at the Université of Quebec in Rimouski (UQAR) Canada
Catarina Santos
Masters of Arts in Perceptual Psychoeducation at the UML, Curative Psychoeducator
CERAP Research Publications
Relating to the body : adding value to the life stories approach within a formative context
Danis Bois & Jeanne-Marie Rugira
This was presented at the Congresso International sobre Pesquisa (Auto) biográfica (CIPA), Tempos, narrativas e ficções : a inveção de si.
Salvador, Bahia, Brezil - 10 to 14 September 2006
Universidade do Estado da Baía – Brasil – Departamento de Educação – Campus 1
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The ‘sensible’ body : where does it stand in educational research ?
Eve Berger
This article was published in Corps et formation, Revue internationale Pratiques de formation, Université Paris 8, No 50, december 2005, pp. 51-64.
The ‘sensible’ dimension of the body, seen as the relationship between experience and its resonance in the body, has not yet been formalized within the context of educational research. This article present some ways to address the issue, namely through a theoretical and experiential approach that is centered on the sense of movement.
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Learning support and strategies of attention to human movement
Download this document (PDF) (J’ajouterais : ) in French, English version not yet available
Research projets
The CERAP’s research projects explore the ‘sensible’ experience of the body and constitute the topics explored in the Masters programms.
Marc Humpich
Presentation to the Colloque International sur L’accompagnement et ses paradoxes (International conference on the theme of support and its paradox - Questions to scientists, practitioners and politicians)
Fontevraud, France, Mai 2003
This presentation explores a researching-acting-formative endeavour centered on the perceptual dimension of learning support which began in 1998 in the Department of Psychosociology of the University of Quebec in Rimouski (UQAR). By exploring the experiential and conceptual components of human movement, it is possible to offer a formative direction which allows the gradual construction of a sense of identity that is new to the learner. Choosing to direct the supportive action towards the perception of what is common to all – the physiological ‘universals’ of human movement – has the paradoxical effect of allowing each one of us to construct ourself, bypassing in this process any cultural or autobiographical boundaries.
Download this document (PDF - in French, English version not yet available)
Research projets
The CERAP’s research projects explore the ‘sensible’ experience of the body and constitute the topics explored in the Masters programms.
Elsa Braga
Frameworks for the practical experience offered by perceptual psychoeducation and the development of a vocal presence.
The link between body-mind tuning, physical action through codified movement and vocal presence.
Research project for Masters.
Teresa Gonçalves
O lugar do corpo sensível na relação interpessoal.
A influência da consciência perceptiva no processo de transformação na relação a si próprio.
Research project for Masters.
Hélène Marchand
Learning focussed dialogue.
Dialogue and the inter-reciprocity between practical experience and theoretical models.
Research project for Masters.
Nadine Quéré
Interaction between psychology, biology, the ‘sensible’, the manual dialogue and bodily experiencing
Research project for Masters.
University courses
Being updated
