Participant Discussion is Critical in Instruction of Nonverbal Intervention

The second unit of CPI’s Nonviolent Crisis Intervention course is loaded with strategies and tools to help us interact with people demonstrating anxious or defensive behaviors. Because it is so full of good ideas, it is important for trainers of this unit to guide participants to talk about the strategies that are shared.

This unit begins with three activities to help participants understand how their behaviors may be influencing the behaviors of those people in crisis. And while the activities themselves are going to leave some indelible imprints on the minds of participants, great conversation about the activities can help participants internalize how they will handle crises different in the future.

To do this, my goal with the discussion I facilitate around these activities is to help people recognize that the three concepts taught in the three activities (promemics, kinesics, and haptics, respectively) can affect a person who is not “in crisis,” so they will undoubtedly affect a person who is experiencing anxiety, defensiveness, and even those people who are demonstrating risk behaviors.

One of the activities, the “proxemics” activity, requires participants to stride towards a partner, causing that partner to provide a physical cue to the other to stop walking when he or she is close enough. My line of questioning following this activity, for instance, includes a line of questioning that goes as follows:

What are some reasons you stopped your partner when you did?

Responses usually indicate that the size, gender, or walking speed of a partner cause the other to put up a “stop sign.” If these things do not come up, I usually ask a follow-up question encouraging participants to consider some of these factors. After some discussion, I then ask:

Can we all agree that we are not currently “anxious” or “defensive” enough to consider ourselves “in-crisis?” 

After some nods, I then continue, “But we all can agree that our partner’s proximity mattered to us?” Again, I will get more nods. This then allows me to ask:

Can we all then agree that a person in-crisis may even be more heavily influenced by the proximity of others?

I usually receive a resounding “yes” from my participants.

This line of questioning usually helps others to recognize the feelings of a person in-crisis. Sometimes, when we are anxious, we want somebody on the other side of the room to be a little closer, to show additional care and concern. Conversely, a person who is “defensive” may need me to stay a little further away, and my goal should be to respect that need, rather than closing the proximity gap between us. Used with the other activities focusing on kinesics and haptics, I can ask similar questions at the end of each discussion:

Can we all agree that “body language” matters when we are not in-crisis? Yes? Then can we agree that it matters even more when we are in-crisis?

Can we all agree that “touch” can escalate or deescalate our emotions when we are not in-crisis? Yes? Then can we agree that it matters even more when we are in crisis?

Whether you use questions like these or not, I hope you strive to engage your participants in valuable discussion in this second unit of the Nonviolent Crisis Intervention course.