Distancing (psychology)

Distancing is a concept arising from the work of developmental psychologists Heinz Werner and Bernard Kaplan to describe the process of establishing a subjects individuality and identity as an essential phase in coming to terms with symbols, referential language and eventually full cognition and linguistic communication.

Werner and Kaplan's work was later expanded and edified into more refined therapeutic practice by the pioneer in deaf-blind patient therapy, Dr. Jan Van Dijk, and later refined by the work of Dr. Susan Bruce. Primarily of use in working with deaf-blind patients, distancing gradually leads the subject through a course of physical interactions which encourage a range of responses connected to the act.

At first, responses may be simple repetitions of pleasurable acts, but eventually events that take place in the present tense are replaced in the subject's mind with more complicated cognitive concepts, such as desires, requests or other expressions which reflect symbolic cognition and understanding of past events.

As the subject progresses through these stages, he is eventually able to move from communicating his desires simply (as in early childhood) to more complicated treatment of symbols in communication. Once the communication barrier is removed, more conventional therapies and educational methodologies are then possible.

References

• Werner, H., & Kaplan, B. (1964). Symbol formation: An organismic-developmental approach to language and expression of thought. London: John Wiley & Sons.
• Van Dijk, J. (1967). The non-verbal deaf-blind and his world: His outgrowth toward the world of symbols: Proceedings of the Jaasrverslag Instituut Voor Doven, 1964–1967
• Bruce, Susan M. (2005) The Application of Werner and Kaplan's Concept of "Distancing" to Children Who Are Deaf-Blind. Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness. August 2005.