EMDR is based on the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model of information. Attending to visual, tactile and/or auditory bilateral stimuli (such as following a visual stimulus from right to left), while focusing on past experiences (e.g., their images, physical sensations and associated feelings) promotes a learning process during which, revisiting these “target” memories, links them with subsequent experiences and thus “updates” them (reprocessing).  Under these conditions, the person learns the empowering adaptive lesson to be learned from their previous experience or memory. Subsequently, the target memory can now be stored with other memories forming part of an adaptive network.

For example, a belief such as “I am in danger” may be replaced by, “It’s over. I’m safe now.” This reframe, and others like it, allow the parasympathetic nervous system (and specifically, the ventral vagal pathway) to gain dominance over the sympathetic nervous system, which operates the so-called “Fight or Flight” response to stress. The person is no longer on high alert, and can relax enough to engage socially with others.

According to Francine Shapiro, the founder of EMDR, the sleep theorist whose work is most compatible with the AIP model is Jonathan Winson. He suggested that mammals process survival information during REM—what the animal experienced during the day is synthesized and stored in memory to help it survive in the future.