The Effectiveness of Art Therapy on School Anxiety, Loneliness, and Social Intelligence of First to Third Grade Elementary School Children
Keywords:
oneliness, social intelligence, art therapy, School anxietyAbstract
The aim of the present study was to determine the effectiveness of art therapy on school anxiety, loneliness, and social intelligence of first to third grade elementary school children. The research was a quasi-experimental study with a pretest–posttest design and a control group. The statistical population consisted of all first to third grade elementary school children in District 1 of Karaj City during the 2024–2025 academic year, of whom 30 participants were purposefully selected and randomly assigned into two groups: experimental (15) and control (15). Data were collected using the Phillips School Anxiety Questionnaire (1987), the Asher et al. Loneliness Scale (1984), and the Silvera et al. Social Intelligence Scale (2001). The art therapy protocol, adapted from the interventions of Landgarten (2013), Liebmann (2015), and Sherwood (2014), was implemented in 10 weekly sessions of 80 minutes each for the experimental group. The control group did not receive any intervention, and at the end of the sessions, a posttest was administered to both groups. For data analysis, descriptive statistics (mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (Shapiro–Wilk test, multivariate analysis of covariance) were employed using SPSS software. Based on the findings, there were significant differences between the adjusted means of the experimental and control groups in the studied variables—school anxiety, loneliness, and social intelligence. Specifically, art therapy led to a significant reduction in school anxiety and loneliness and a significant increase in social intelligence among first to third grade elementary school children. Therefore, it can be concluded that art therapy has an effect on school anxiety, loneliness, and social intelligence in first to third grade elementary school children.
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