Polyvagal Theory Is Being Challenged — and Why I Still Trust the Yoga
- Kendra Boone
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Polyvagal Theory is currently being called “untenable” by a group of scientists.
There are formal critiques.
There are published responses.
There is strong opinion on both sides.
As a yoga therapist who has worked clinically with bodies for more than three decades, I find this moment neither alarming nor dismissible. It invites reflection.
Whenever a dominant framework is challenged, we are given an opportunity to examine what we have relied upon, what we may have overextended, and what deeper foundations remain steady beneath it.
And in that reflection, I find myself returning to something simple:
I can trust the yoga.
When Science Refines Itself
The recent critique, led by researchers including Marinus van IJzendoorn, questions aspects of Polyvagal Theory’s evolutionary narrative and neurological precision.
In simple terms, the critique questions:
Whether the idea that our nervous system has a clear “hierarchy” of older and newer vagal systems is as strongly supported as originally suggested.
Whether what is often described as a distinct “dorsal vagal shutdown” state is truly a separate, clearly identifiable biological mechanism.
Whether common physiological measures, like heart rate variability, directly prove the broader claims made by the theory.
These are questions about how precisely the biology aligns with the theory — not about whether the vagus nerve matters, or whether regulation and co-regulation are real human experiences.
Stephen Porges has responded, clarifying and defending the theory’s foundations. This exchange is not unusual. It is how science evolves — through critique, tension, and refinement.
And yet, clinical work does not pause while theory adjusts.
People continue to arrive in states of activation, withdrawal, vigilance, grief, vitality, exhaustion. The body continues to speak. Our responsibility is to meet it there.
I want to be transparent about my own position in this conversation. I have trained in the Safe and Sound Protocol and undertaken professional development informed by Dr. Porges’ work.
I have read widely in this field and value the relational framing offered by Deb Dana, whose work has helped many practitioners translate Polyvagal Theory into compassionate clinical language.
At one stage, I explored integrating yoga therapy with the Safe and Sound Protocol more formally. Over time, however, I did not observe consistent, sustainable shifts that felt aligned with the depth of integration I seek in trauma work. The outcomes were variable and required careful screening and pacing.
My decision to step back from integrating SSP was not ideological. It was clinical.
It reflected what I was witnessing in real bodies, in real relational contexts. That experience reinforced something essential for me: theory must remain in dialogue with lived outcomes.
When the body gives us feedback, we must listen.
Theory Is a Lens — Not the Nervous System Itself
Polyvagal Theory has offered many clinicians helpful language around co-regulation, social engagement, and autonomic shifts. For some clients, this language has been deeply validating.
But no theory is the nervous system.
It is a lens — a structured attempt to describe something inherently relational and complex.
Evidence is shaped by what can be measured, funded, and published. It is provisional.
Bodies are not provisional.
They are lived, contextual, relational, and historically shaped.
In yoga therapy, our work unfolds in that lived field.
Yoga Therapy Was Already Working With These Rhythms
Long before vagal hierarchies were proposed, yogic philosophy articulated systemic fluctuations through the Gunas in the Bhagavad Gita:
Rajas — activation and propulsion
Tamas — heaviness and withdrawal
Sattva — clarity and steadiness
These are not diagnoses. They are movements within nature.
In clinical application, the Gunas offer a non-pathologising way to recognise internal states. They allow someone to observe, often for the first time:
What feels mobilised right now?What feels heavy?What supports steadiness here?
This is practical psychoeducation, grounded in embodied awareness.
And importantly, it is personalised. Yoga therapy is not a one-size-fits-all model seeking to categorise individuals into fixed regulatory types. It responds to the person in front of us — in context, in relationship.
Holding a Wider Lens
There is a two-way conversation between brain and body — something yoga has always recognised.
Where I become cautious is not in the science itself, but in the way Western medical research can sometimes approach the body: fragmented, reductionist, searching for singular mechanisms.
This approach has contributed enormously to medical progress.
Trauma itself fragments experience.
But healing requires us to work with the whole system — relational, historical, embodied — not just isolated parts.
When healing is reduced to one pathway, one correct explanation, one definitive model, the complexity of lived experience can become flattened. For people living with trauma, rigid or overly black-and-white narratives can feel destabilising. They can subtly reinforce the sense that there is a “right” way to regulate and a “wrong” way to respond.
Yoga therapy is comfortable in the grey.
It works with fluctuation.
It honours paradox.
It allows multiple lenses to coexist.
This does not reject science. It complements it.
It keeps the frame wide enough to hold complexity without collapsing into certainty.
A Decolonising Responsibility
There is also a deeper layer to this debate.
Much of what Polyvagal Theory names — co-regulation, relational safety, embodied awareness — has long existed within Indigenous, yogic, and contemplative traditions. These understandings were preserved through lineage and lived practice long before they were described in contemporary neuroscience.
When Western frameworks become the dominant reference point for regulation, there is a risk that older traditions are positioned as secondary or in need of validation.
As Audre Lorde wrote,
“The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.”
Her words remind us that knowledge systems are not neutral; they reflect power.
Somatic therapist Resmaa Menakem has spoken extensively about trauma as something that lives not only in individual bodies but within collective and historical systems. Regulation cannot be abstracted from context.
A “safe” nervous system state does not look the same for every body.
To decolonise practice does not mean rejecting scientific inquiry. It means refusing to allow one framework to eclipse others. It means inviting ancient voices into contemporary dialogue without requiring them to conform in order to be legitimate.
Yoga therapy, when practised with integrity, already holds this plurality.
What I Am Staying With
The current critique does not destabilise my clinical work.
It invites curiosity.
It discourages dogma.
It reminds me not to outsource authority.
In my Three Rhythms retreats and trauma-informed sessions, what creates meaningful shift is not theoretical precision.
It is relationship.
Does the language reduce shame?
Does it increase choice?Does it support connection?
That is the measure that matters.
Science will continue to refine itself.
I will continue to engage with it.
And I will continue to trust the yoga.
References
Polyvagal Debate
Grossman, P., van IJzendoorn, M., et al. (2023/2024). Critical evaluation of Polyvagal Theory and its neurophysiological claims.(Multi-author critique challenging core assumptions of PVT.)
Stephen Porges (2023). Scholarly response to critiques of Polyvagal Theory. Clinical Neuropsychiatry.(Response clarifying theoretical position and addressing criticisms.)
The Polyvagal Theory. W.W. Norton & Company.(Foundational text outlining the theory’s evolutionary and autonomic framework.)
Yoga Therapy & Autonomic Integration
Marlysa Sullivan. Publications on yoga therapy integration with autonomic science and trauma-informed frameworks.(Explores bridges between yogic philosophy and contemporary neurobiology.)
Sullivan, M.B., Erb, M., Schmalzl, L., Moonaz, S., Noggle Taylor, J., & Porges, S.W. (2018). Yoga Therapy and Polyvagal Theory: The Convergence of Traditional Wisdom and Contemporary Neuroscience for Self-Regulation and Resilience. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.(Important integrative paper linking PVT and yoga therapy practice.)
Yogic Philosophy
Bhagavad Gita. Classical text describing the Gunas (Rajas, Tamas, Sattva) as fluctuating qualities of nature and consciousness.
Feuerstein, G. (1998). The Yoga Tradition. Hohm Press.(Comprehensive overview of yogic philosophy and psychology.)
Decolonial & Somatic Perspectives
Audre Lorde (1984). Sister Outsider. Crossing Press.(“The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.”)
Resmaa Menakem (2017). My Grandmother’s Hands. Central Recovery Press.(Explores trauma within bodies and systems, including racialised nervous system patterns.)