Abstract:

Attention problems are a tendency to get distracted easily and inability to concentrate for an extended period. Attention problems in children can be a symptom underlying different conditions such as trauma, dissociation, emotional instability, a hostile family environment and a genetic predisposition to develop an attention deficit disorder. Children with attention problems are more likely to experience academic problems during school years (Taylor, 2011; Washbrook et al. 2013). From adolescence onwards, these problems of attention have been linked with drug abuse (Galéra et al. 2013) and pathological gambling (Ferguson & Ceranoglu, 2014). These children will have a high probability of socioeconomic disadvantage when they reach adulthood (Galéra et al. 2012). Different studies agree that medication for attention problems must be accompanied by psychological and educational interventions. Most research using art therapy with children with attention problems has focused on improving socialization and enhancing the effects of multidisciplinary treatment. There is some evidence that art based interventions may reduce some of the difficulties associated with attention problems in children: Henley (1999) found that creative arts can increase the success of other therapeutic interventions. Jenny Murphy (2004), concluded that an art therapy group treatment can improve self-esteem, self-control and the proper maintenance of personal physical space and the limits and norms of the environment. This work details an art therapy group program in a school in Spain, examining the changes in the attention problems for seven children from ages 6 to 11 years old. Art therapy groups were composed by five to seven children, and took place for one hour weekly sessions during one academic year. Parents of children participating in the research, completed a pre and posttest BASC questionnaire. In the BASC questionnaire, the scale of attention problems does not saturate high in the factor of externalizing problems, being the reason why it detects children who can be distracted, while having in addition a correlation of 0.55 with the scale of hyperactivity. The conclusions on the process of all children in the art therapy group, are explained by the therapist´s notes and data registry sheets for the three categories of process, art and environment. There is also a statistical analysis of mean difference - by t test for paired samples - of responses to the attention problems scales of the questionnaire BASC. According to the children´s parents, attention problems decrease significantly after treatment (t = 2,926, p = 0.026) from 54,71 points to 46,71 points (difference = 8). By this analysis, we have found a statistically significant reduction -in parents´ questionnaires- on the scale of attention problems. If we had counted with a larger sample, the decrease of attention problems in the different groups might give more information on the influence of other factors such as age, gender and exact number of treatment sessions. From the data collected in this study, we conclude that art therapy groups in the school setting may improve children´s attention problems. Further studies could explore which types of attention problems benefit more from an art therapy intervention, together with differences in treatment outcome depending on family history and genetic predispositions.

Keywords:

Group, art therapy, attention problems, counselling, psychology.