“We’re a good team, anyway”:

Abstract

Set within a specialist neurobehavioural rehabilitation unit, this single case study explores a multifaceted, person-centred music therapy approach (drawing from psychodynamic, relational, and ecological underpinnings) with an individual experiencing behavioural challenges subsequent to acquired brain injury (ABI). A review of existing literature features music therapy as an effective, evidence-based approach within general neurorehabilitation settings for people with ABI. This literature, however, centered heavily around music therapy methods that contribute to recovery and compensation of lost brain function, and much less around methods centred around emotional or psychosocial aims. A gap in the literature was found when narrowing the search to encompass each underpinning of this case study's explored music therapy approach within the specific context of neurobehavioural rehabilitation. A qualitative approach, guided by hermeneutic phenomenology was used within an interpretivist-constructivist paradigm, and findings were presented as a single case study. A thematic analysis of supervision notes, and reflective and reflexive journal entries, generated three main themes of the music therapy process shared between the client, the music therapist, and the setting. This single case study also featured the ways in which the various underpinnings of the evolving music therapy approach contributed to the neurobehavioural rehabilitation of the client. This case study adds to the literature on emotional and psychosocial music therapy approaches within neurobehavioural rehabilitation. It illustrates how a person-centred approach encompassing relational, psychodynamic, and ecological perspectives may fit within a neurobehavioural rehabilitation setting.