Invention and Validation of Five New Art Therapy Techniques for Children

Objective: Art therapy has the largest number of therapeutic techniques among all of the known psychotherapies. Although this type of psychotherapy was first established for children, later and over time it has become a method for the treatment of adults. The present research was carried out following two scientific-clinical challenges. The first challenge was related to the large number of adult-specific art therapy techniques and the very small number of children-specific techniques. The current research was originally started with the aim of solving the first challenge, but on the way to achieve this goal, the second challenge also appeared. The recent challenge was related to the validation of innovative techniques. There were no indicators to validate the techniques individually. Therefore, inventing an index to evaluate the efficiency of each technique alone became the second goal of this research.
Research Methodology: All the research sets underlying the present paper were conducted using a single-subject method that falls under the category of experimental research. However, the specific research method can be considered a qualitative method because it was used in both the primary validation (by Delphi method) and the secondary validation of the techniques (based on the efficiency index).
Findings: A total of five art therapy techniques specific to children (Hidden colored pencil, White rug, Patchwork, Ugly painting, & Defensive shield) and an index to evaluate their efficiency are introduced in this study. The results of the validation of the techniques and the degree of concordance between the evaluators' opinions indicate the validity of the techniques introduced in the study.
Conclusion: Based on the research findings, the introduced innovative techniques can be considered valid techniques, but considering the research method, generalization of the results requires more research.