Improving the Short-Term Affect of Grieving Children Through Art

Abstract

We evaluated changes in positive and negative affect of grieving children in response to art making compared to another noncreative, non-expressive, but engaging visuospatial task and assessed whether art making was equally or differentially effective in individual versus collaborative settings. We randomly assigned grieving children to one of four interventions: art created individually, art created in collaboration with peers, puzzles completed individually, or puzzles completed in collaboration with peers. Children who created art individually experienced a significant decrease in negative affect, whereas children in the other three groups did not. Together, these results provide empirical evidence that the creative and expressive aspects of art make it effective for improving mood in grieving children.

Funding

This study was supported by grants from the Program for Undergraduate Research Committee and the Center for High Achievement and Scholarly Engagement at Butler University, Indianapolis.