There has been a noticeable shift in how polyvagal theory is being spoken about. Some recent papers have challenged aspects of the theory, and this has quickly filtered into wider conversations as claims that it has been disproven. That does not quite match what I am seeing. The discussion feels more unsettled than that, and also more interesting.

I want to be clear about where I am writing from. I have worked with ideas that come from polyvagal theory and found them useful, particularly in bringing attention to the body and to shifts in state. At the same time, I would not describe myself as holding the theory in its original depth. It is a dense piece of work, and much of what circulates in training spaces is already a translation of it. That feels relevant to what is happening now.

What The Critics Are Saying

The most substantive recent challenge came in 2026 in Clinical Neuropsychiatry, in a paper led by Paul Grossman and published with a large group of researchers working in areas such as autonomic physiology, vagal neuroscience, and evolution. The paper argues that some of the core claims of polyvagal theory are not supported by current evidence.

The critique focuses on a few key areas. One concerns how heart rate variability has been used within the theory as an indicator of vagal activity. The authors argue that this measure is influenced by multiple factors and cannot be taken as a clear window into specific nervous system states in the way the theory suggests.

Another area concerns the evolutionary framing of the theory. Polyvagal theory proposes a layered organisation of the nervous system, with newer, more socially oriented systems developing in mammals alongside older survival responses. The critics argue that the comparative evidence does not support this sequence as cleanly as it is often presented.

These are not minor points. They relate to how the theory is structured. At the same time, the debate is ongoing. Porges has responded at length, arguing that the critique misrepresents the theory and engages with a simplified version of it rather than the original work.

What we are seeing is an active disagreement within the field, not a settled conclusion.

What Seems to Hold

Alongside that dispute, there are things that appear more stable. Whatever happens to the more specific anatomical claims, broader ideas about physiological state, arousal, breathing, and relational context are supported across psychophysiology and reflected in clinical practice. The presence and tone of another person can shift how someone’s system settles or activates. These are not ideas that stand or fall with the specific claims being contested.

The Problem With Categories

As polyvagal theory has spread through training programmes and clinical culture, there has been a drift toward reductionism. In many settings it is used in a categorical way, with complex and shifting experience organised into fixed types. You will hear people described as being in dorsal vagal shutdown, or as being in a particular state, as if that fully captures what is happening.

This is where something like a Gestalt caution applies. When we fix on a named figure, we risk losing the ground it emerges from. A person is always more than the pattern we are currently tracking, and experience rarely reduces to a single state. Someone might appear flat in tone but be internally alert. They might be engaged in what is being said while holding real tension elsewhere. Sensation, emotion, memory, and relational context organise together, and that whole is not the same as any one of its parts.

Part of what seems to be under challenge may be the theory itself, and part may be the more categorical version of it that has spread through training and practice.

Staying With What I Can Observe

When I notice something shift, a change in breathing, a quality of stillness, a voice that tightens or opens, I am not trying to name which state it belongs to. I am trying to stay with it long enough to let it mean something. The language of states can help orient that attention. It gives a way of noticing patterns that might otherwise pass unremarked. But if it settles too quickly into an explanation, it starts to close things down rather than open them up.

What I find more useful is staying with the movement of experience as it unfolds, allowing for the possibility that multiple processes are happening at once, and that they may not fit neatly into any single category.

Where I Stand

I have respect for polyvagal theory and for what it has opened up, a way of bringing attention to the body, to state, and to the relational signals that shape how we experience ourselves and others. I hold it as a set of ideas that have sometimes helped me see more clearly, knowing my understanding of it is partial.

The current debate, for me, is not primarily a question of whether the theory is right or wrong. It is a reminder that no framework, however useful, is the same as the person in front of you. And that the moment we are most certain about what we are seeing is often the moment worth pausing.

I have also found that some of these ideas land meaningfully with clients, not as diagnosis or explanation, but as a way of making sense of experiences that can otherwise feel confusing or shameful. That has value, whatever the scientific debate ultimately concludes.

I expect I will continue to use ideas from the theory where they help. And I expect I will continue to come up against the limits of my understanding of it.

For me, that feels like a reasonable place to stand.