Canadian psychologists: Explore safety, connection, and the autonomic nervous system using attachment and Polyvagal theory in these CEU courses.
This talk explores how physiological state shapes our experience of safety, threat, connection and regulation. Beginning with the embodied and bidirectional relationship between the brain and body, it introduces the autonomic nervous system and the vagus nerve before examining the central concepts of Polyvagal Theory, including neuroception, co-regulation, mobilisation and immobilisation.
The presentation considers how regulatory capacities develop within early attachment relationships and how trauma may alter the nervous system’s sensitivity to danger, narrow behavioural flexibility and disrupt the capacity to connect. It then translates these ideas into clinical practice, with particular attention to relational safety, choice, pacing, sensory differences and the therapeutic process.
Polyvagal Theory is presented as a valuable framework for understanding protective autonomic responses rather than as a complete or settled account of nervous-system functioning. The talk therefore distinguishes between its clinically useful principles and the evolutionary, neuroanatomical and psychophysiological claims that remain scientifically debated. The central aim is to support a compassionate, evidence-informed understanding of human behaviour: not to make every nervous system calm, but to help people become safer, more flexible and more able to choose.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this talk, participants will be able to:
Explain the bidirectional relationship between the brain, body and autonomic nervous system, including the roles of the vagus nerve and autonomic states in shaping experiences of safety, threat, connection and regulation.
Describe key concepts within Polyvagal Theory, including neuroception, co-regulation, mobilisation and immobilisation, and distinguish clinically useful principles from evolutionary, neuroanatomical and psychophysiological claims that remain scientifically debated.
Evaluate how early attachment relationships contribute to the development of regulatory capacities, and recognise how trauma and disrupted attachment may affect sensitivity to threat, behavioural flexibility and capacity for interpersonal connection.
Apply an understanding of autonomic states, attachment and trauma to clinical practice, using strategies that promote relational safety, choice, pacing, co-regulation and sensitivity to individual sensory and regulatory differences.
Integrate an evidence-informed, compassionate understanding of protective nervous-system responses into the therapeutic process, with the aim of supporting greater safety, flexibility, connection and capacity for choice rather than simply seeking to achieve a state of calm.
Address the recent critiques of polyvagal theory within the scientific community and understand the evidence base and theoretical usefulness of polyvagal theory in clinical practice in light of these critiques.