ART THERAPY AND TRAUMA

Running head: ART THERAPY AND TRAUMA
Art Therapy and Trauma
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ART THERAPY AND TRAUMA
Abstract
Art therapy has become quite popular since years as a clinical method for treating patients with
mental and emotional disturbances and instability. Art therapy is a process in which the
therapists make the patients express their problems or causes of their mental illness through any
art form, such as, coloring, drawing, painting, making collages or sculpting. In many cases,
children, women or elderly people become too vulnerable after having any type of traumatic
experience and they start suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). They become
unable to express themselves and share their problems to the therapists and in such cases, art
therapy was found to be extremely beneficial. This paper provides an overview of effectiveness
of art therapy in healing the mental disorders and traumatic experiences of people through a
literature review. Theories as foundations of art therapies have been highlighted and with the
types of art therapies. It has been observed that art therapy has been majorly used to heal trauma-
induced mental and emotional disorders, while its effectiveness in treating the physical impacts
have not been studied extensively.

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ART THERAPY AND TRAUMA
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Search strategy.................................................................................................................................4
Statement on the state of literature..................................................................................................4
Discussion........................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................11
References......................................................................................................................................13

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ART THERAPY AND TRAUMA
Introduction
Art Therapy has been found to be extremely useful for improving mental health of
people. The foundation of Art Therapy revolves around the concept of the usefulness of creative
expression in treating the mental illness and stress and fostering the mental well-being of people.
Art, whether creating or viewing, is an efficient technique of exploring the emotions, developing
self-awareness, coping with stress, boosting self-esteem, and working on the social skills (King
2016). Thus, it is beneficial for improving the mental health of the people. The research studies
have shown that art therapy has helped people to improve their communication and social skills,
and discovering different aspects of their personalities. Hence, not only mental health, but
emotional and physical health of people also improves through art therapy. Mental illness
includes various types of illnesses, which are caused due to several reasons. Trauma is one type
of mental or psychological illness that affects the emotional, physical and mental wellbeing of
people in a very severe manner (Greenacre 2018). It is a phenomenon that causes deep distress
and disturbing experiences to people, who goes through some type of distressing event. Trauma
can have very deep and significant impact on people as it can hamper the ability of an individual
to cope and can cause feeling of loneliness, helplessness, lowers their confidence and self-
respect, and hampers their ability to express their emotions and experiences (Van der Kolk
2017). This essay will focus on exploring the art therapy and various aspects and its significance
in treating the traumatic disorders or effects of trauma among the patients. The paper will have a
comprehensive discussion on the research strategy, previous literatures describing the features,
types, and effectiveness of art therapy, causes and effects of trauma, and how art therapy can be
used to treat the traumatic experiences among the people.