This study investigates the influence of art therapy on elementary school senior-grade children, especially on their emotional expressiveness, stress coping strategies as well as art self-expression. For this purpose, the 4th grade children of two-cla...
This study investigates the influence of art therapy on elementary school senior-grade children, especially on their emotional expressiveness, stress coping strategies as well as art self-expression. For this purpose, the 4th grade children of two-classes were selected as a participant group in Seoul. With the consent of the principal, homeroom teachers, and parents, 30 participants of one class were assigned to the Experimental Group(EG) and 30 participants of the other class were assigned to the Control Group(CG). Excluding the data of participants dropout, 42 data were obtained. 20 data of EG and 22 data of CG were examined for the final analysis.
EG children were provided with the weekly class of art therapy (eight sessions over a two-month period; one session per 40 min.) instead of regular art-class. CG children were not provided with any art therapeutic activities. Both group were evaluated with the scales of emotional expressivity and of stress coping strategies, as well as DAPR(Draw A Person in the Rain) assessment.
In order to present the changes before/after the school art therapy, the paired samples t-test was conducted. Also, ASEA(Art Self-Expression Ability) assessment was measured in EG in order to examine the changes the art works. ASEA was conducted by selecting works of the 1st and 8th session of school art therapy.
The results of this study could be summarized as follows:
First, before/after the school art therapy, EG’s emotional expressivity scale showed significantly increased, while CG did not show any significant changes.
Second, before/after the school art therapy, EG showed a significant increase in stress coping strategies, whereas no significant or meaningful changes in the CG.
Third, There is a significant difference between EG and CG in the scores of ‘stress’ and ‘coping capacity’ in DAPR assessment. In other words, CG did not show any significant changes in the DAPR before/after.
Fourth, this study indicated EG showed a significant improvement in ASEA, comparing 1st with 8th drawings after school art therapy session.
This study shows that the art therapy in school gives children a positive and meaningful influence on their emotional expressiveness, stress coping strategies and art self-expression. The result of this study proves that the school art therapy as a psychological service to elementary school students provides a supportive program, which is to prevent and reduce social and emotional problems.