NeuroAffective Touch® is a professional somatic training that introduces psychotherapists and bodyworkers to the use of touch as a vital bridge to body-mind integration. By highlighting the primary role of the body and emphasizing its equal importance to the mind, NeuroAffective Touch® (NATouch™) addresses emotional, relational, and developmental deficits that cannot be reached by verbal means alone.

A polyvagal-informed psychobiological approach, NeuroAffective Touch® integrates the key elements of somatic psychotherapy, attachment and developmental theory, psychodynamic psychotherapy, and affective and interpersonal neurobiology.

The training is designed to progressively build psychotherapists’ skill and confidence in integrating body-centered interventions into their psychological clinical practice. It also supports bodyworkers in developing the verbal and psychological skills necessary to assist their clients in connecting their neurobiological states to a conscious narrative.

To find out more about the second module of this training click here

Dr. Aline LaPierre

Dr. Aline LaPierre, the creator of NeuroAffective Touch®, is a clinician, author, artist, consultant, speaker, and teacher, and was past faculty in the somatic doctoral program at Santa Barbara Graduate Institute (2000-2010). She is currently President of the United States Association of Body Psychotherapy and Editor-in-Chief of the International Body Psychotherapy Journal.

Dr. LaPierre co-authored the bestselling book Healing Developmental Trauma: How Trauma Affects Self-Regulation, Self-Image, and the Capacity for Relationship, available in 14 languages.

In the field of psychotherapy, she is a graduate of Pacifica Graduate Institute and The New Center for Psychoanalysis.

In the field of somatics, she has studied Somatic Experiencing®, Postural Integration, Cranio-Sacral Therapy, Reichian Therapies, Bodynamics Analysis, Continuum, BodyMind Centering, and EMDR.