Psychotherapeutic development: Assessment of Pictures through development of the SATPA – a safety assessment tool of pictorial artefacts

Based in a neurophenomenological approach, the thesis describes the rationale for a newly developed tool named the Safety Assessment Tool of Pictorial Artefacts (SATPA) and its internal and external validation, where it was used to evaluate paintings related to experiences of gynecological cancer survivors, as seen through their paintings of their bodies.
The developed SATPA offers 11 clearly defined perspectives based on the assumption that pictorial artefacts could be used as proxy measures to detect patterns of neuroception, a concept developed by Porges (2001, 2011), relating to activation levels of the central nervous system, and to experienced appraisals of safety and threat.
Main findings are:
A proposed connection between experienced safety and positive affects, detectable in pictorial artefacts, PAs and the SATPA for assessing levels of perceived safety in PAs.
The value of the picture as a rich source of information.
The general human capacity of appraisal of PAs, since different categories of evaluators such as laypeople and health professionals, rated the pictures similarly to the art therapists.
An additional finding relates to the drawings from the internal validation, N = 269, depicting reassuring respectively worrying professional meetings and the value of the picture for indicating the professional strain clinicians experience during their daily routines.