The purpose of this study was to analyze the effect of art therapy programs conducted from 2004 to 2009 in Korea for elementary school students, and the dependency of the effect on each dependent variable or moderating variable. As a method for the st...
The purpose of this study was to analyze the effect of art therapy programs conducted from 2004 to 2009 in Korea for elementary school students, and the dependency of the effect on each dependent variable or moderating variable. As a method for the study, a meta-analysis is used for inducing a synthetic conclusion by converting results of many studies to particular index values. For the analysis, 108 of doctoral dissertations, master thesis, and articles which study solutions using art therapy for problems of elementary school students were examined. And finally, 91 studies were selected, which compare the latter with the former clearly by setting up experiment group and control group, present statistical values of results obviously, are proper for the condition of dependent variables. Since many of the studies measured more than one dependent variables, from the 91 studies, 162 effect sizes were calculated by Cohen's analysis method(1998) and used for further analysis.
The results of the meta-analysis are summarized as follows. Firstly, the overall mean effect size of the art therapy programs in this study turned out to be 1.79. The result shows that art therapy programs for elementary school students were very effective. Secondly, by each dependent variable, the mean effect size on emotion of art therapy programs in this study was 2.06, the mean effect size on problem action of that was 1.86, the mean effect size on self-consciousness of that was 1.74, and the mean effect size on sociality of that was 1.54. Thirdly, the mean effect size of the art therapy programs classified by moderating variables(grade, character of a group, group size, total session, session duration, intervention period) is also calculated. By grade, the mean effect size is 1.95 for senior grade, 1.53 for lower grade, and 1.73 for mixed grade. By character of a group, 1.85 for maladjusted children, 1.70 for normal children, 1.54 for disabled children. By group size, 2.08 for less than 7 children, 1.96 for 8~19 children, 0.94 for more than 20 children. By total session, 2.79 for 16~20 times, 1.80 for more than 21 times, 1.48 for 11~15 times, 1.25 for less than 10 times. By session duration, 2.30 for less than 60 minutes, 1.67 for more than 90 minutes, 1.65 for 60~90 minutes. At last, By intervention period, 2.05 for 13~16 weeks, 1.97 for more than 17 weeks, 1.77 for 9~12 weeks, 1.67 for 5~8 weeks, 1.39 for 1~4 weeks.
The conclusion of the study are followings. Firstly, art therapy programs on elementary school students are very effective. Secondly, art therapy for emotion is the most effective in various dependent variables. Thirdly, as a result of each moderating variable, art therapy for higher grade, maladjusted children, smaller group and during shorter session duration is more effective. And, when total session is 16~20 times, and intervention period is 13~16 weeks, the programs have the largest effect.
This study can enlarge applicability of art therapy and provide a basic information helping to design and conduct studies on effectiveness of art therapy programs as well as to organize or operate effective art therapy programs in the future.