The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of group art therapy on Korean demented elderly. The design of the study was one group pretest-posttest test design. The subjects were 10 dementia sufferers who were attend to dementia day care cent...
The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of group art therapy on Korean demented elderly. The design of the study was one group pretest-posttest test design. The subjects were 10 dementia sufferers who were attend to dementia day care center located in Daegu City.
A program comprised of 20 sessions group art therapy was administered to both groups for 3 months, beginning of January, 2000. The evaluating tools for the present study were Communication scale (Holedn, U. P., Sinebruchow. L. 1979) and Social Behaviors scale (Trower,P., Bryanrt, B. and Argyle, M. 1978) paired t-test were employed for statistical analyses.
The study explored the following research questions.
1. What effects does the group art therapy have on the Communications of the demented elderly?
2. What effects does the group art therapy have on the Social Behaviors of the demented elderly?
The major findings of the present study can be summarized as follows.
First, the group art therapy resulted in the increment of such communication as taking part in the events, interest in other's works, and empathy for other's presence and their works.
Second, the group art therapy also resulted in the increment of Social Behaviors aspects for the demented elderly
In short, the group art therapy program employed in this study seemed to have beneficial effects on the Communications and the social behaviors the demented elderly in Korea.