As someone who has sung their whole life and sang mezzo soprano for a service oriented a capella group, music as a healing mechanism has always been an intuitive concept for me. I wanted to dive deeper into this idea and apply it to loneliness, which is extremely relevant now in the Corona-crisis.

For My Mind Brain Behavior Seminar Final Paper:

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The Marvels of Music as an Intervention for Increasingly Lonely 18-22 Year Olds

By: Grace Cen

 

“The greatest disease in the West today is not TB or leprosy; it is feeling unwanted, unloved, and uncared for.” - Mother Teresa

 

Abstract: Loneliness is a serious public health issue that affects more than one third of Americans, all of whom express the lack of perceived social connection and support they feel. As such a pervasive affliction of our modern world, it is increasingly important to angle our health care and community based programs to address loneliness, especially because it is a consistent part of the mental health pathology (corresponds to an increased risk of depression and anxiety). Previous loneliness literature has been much more so oriented to older adults, and research has found music (choir singing, music making with students) to be an effective intervention for loneliness in seniors, particularly those with dementia. However, limited attention has been given towards music as a treatment for loneliness in 18 to 22-year-olds (Generation Z), the generation with the highest CIGNA U.S. Loneliness Index score (Cigna 6). I will be thus using this paper to amass the empirical evidence, regardless of short supply, that suggests how promising music therapy is as a nonintrusive prescription for young adult loneliness, discuss current programs that put this into practice, and advocate for a greater need for efforts in the music therapy space to be placed here.  

 

Section 1: Understanding Loneliness

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Loneliness Index

Young adults report higher rates of loneliness than older generations and therefore need more devoted social resources than they are receiving, both in longitudinal studies involving them and university programming for them. According to a 2018 survey conducted of 20,096 U.S. adults, Generation Z (18-22 years old) is lonelier and claim to be in worse health than older generations. Participants are asked to answer 20 questions based off of the UCLA loneliness scale (most frequently used instrument to measure loneliness); questions like how often they feel like no one knows them well, feeling like the people around them are not necessarily with them, that they belong to a group of friends, etcetera. Gen Zers have the highest loneliness score (48.3) where a score of 43 or higher is considered lonely. They are also the least likely generation to report that their physical health is good, very good or excellent (65%) (Cigna 6), which potentially hints at a relationship between loneliness and physical health to be discussed in the section below. Perhaps more convincing evidence for this link is the survey finding that participants who reported feeling less lonely were also more likely to report being in good overall mental and physical health. 

 

Figure 1: Feelings of Loneliness Most Prevalent Among Generation Z

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source: Cigna 2018 Loneliness Report 

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Types of loneliness

Loneliness is an emotion evolutionarily designed to be painful, warning us of the threat of isolation. Loneliness can be classified into three categories: situational loneliness, characterized by challenging circumstantial/ environmental factors such as immigration, interpersonal conflicts, divorce or death; developmental loneliness, characterized by a perceived isolation due to a feeling of developing at a different pace as their peers; and internal loneliness, characterized by low self-esteem, guilt, and poor inner social coping strategies. 

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Loneliness Correlates

One must understand loneliness’ mental and physical health correlates in order to properly understand how sweepingly large loneliness is as a problem. Loneliness is often a precursor to psychiatric disorders like depression, anxiety, chronic stress, personality disorders, alcoholism, and Alzheimer’s disease. In our focus on young adults, we will be primarily focusing on loneliness’ relationship to depression, stress, and anxiety. 

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1. Depression: The lonely suffer from some depressive symptoms such as reporting to be less satisfied with life, less happy, and more helpless and pessimistic. Lonely people are vulnerable to depression because those that are “insecurely attached” often develop low self esteem and a negative self protective lens that leads to a depressive spiral. The important distinction here is that while depression is characterized by hopelessness, lonely people still believe that all will be fine once their longing for true connection with someone is fulfilled. 

2. Stress, Weaker Immunity: Loneliness is a source of chronic stress (prolonged periods of stress) where we suppress anabolism or regeneration as our bodies need energy instead to enter fight or flight mode (the sympathetic nervous system takes over) (Theorell 15). This makes our organ systems and immune systems feeble due to the constant breakdown of cells. In addition, loneliness is also associated with less natural killer (NK) cell activity, leukocytes with lower gene expression of genes that have to do with antiviral responses, and higher antibody titers,⁴ all reflective of a weaker immune system. 

3. Anxiety: Loneliness also has been experimentally proven to augment anxiety. One well cited experiment asked highly hypnotizable participants to both recall a time when they felt lonely and another where they felt like their relational and social needs were being met (Cacioppo 22). When induced to feel lonely, participants had higher anger and anxiety scores. They also had lower social skills and self-esteem scores than when induced to feel socially connected. These findings suggest that lonely individuals are not lonely because they lack fundamental social skills, but because their loneliness causes them to feel more unlikeable and scared to mess up. Their negative social expectations cause them to look for and overreact to any behavior from others that reinforces such expectations, and this, combined with the fact that lonely individuals are also more likely to withdraw from stressors instead of problem solving and seeking emotional support from others, contributes to a vicious and isolative, loneliness feedback cycle. 

 

Through raising stress levels and exacerbating depression and anxiety, loneliness manifests itself into poorer academic performance for our 18-22 year old target individuals. According to a study conducted by the American College Health Association in 2019, 27% of college students reported that anxiety drove them to a lower grade on an exam or class, and 20% of students reported that depression caused them to perform worse academically (American College Health Association 6). Beyond academic impact, loneliness, through its added stress and harm to the immune system and sleep, results in a twenty-six percent increase in risk of premature mortality as opposed to non-lonely counterparts. To put this in context, loneliness is just as harmful to longevity as smoking fifteen cigarettes a day. If left untreated, loneliness is lethal: to psychological health, everyday performance, and physical health. 

 

Section 2: How Music Reduces Loneliness

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Regular musical experiences can remedy loneliness in a few broad ways; through passive musical experiences, music can serve as a much needed (1) Social surrogacy, or (2) ambient noise. Active musical experiences, on the other hand, can help (3) Develop opportunities for social interaction, and focus more on (4) Deliberately recognizing maladaptive social cognition⁴. 

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Music as a social surrogate

The idea of solitary music listening functioning as a social encounter (Wallmark et al., 2018) and that the mind can conceive music as the state of mind of an imagined person (Persona theory) has long been at the forefront of social cognition theory. Accordingly, the mood-congruency hypothesis claims that listening to mood congruent music may be akin to emotional sharing with an empathetic friend, and thus most relevant for those who experience situational loneliness due to interpersonal conflict, rather than internal or developmental loneliness (Lee et al., 2013). Evidence for this comes from an experiment where participants who wrote about social loss expressed a strong preference for mood congruent music as opposed to non mood congruent music, relative to control participants who wrote of non social loss. In direct opposition to this is mood management theory, the idea that those loneliness can be eased and distracted from using entertaining, non congruent modes of entertainment (in this case music). This would be akin to interacting with a funny friend.

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A paper published in 2020 found that music does act as a social surrogate for those with situational loneliness, irrespective of congruence of music. The study employed a sample size of 90 with a mean age of 26 years old (fairly close to our target age range). Each participant was randomly assigned to one of the following 6 conditions: three mood induction conditions achieved through a guided visualization technique— (1) Interpersonal sadness aka imagining the death of the participant’s own father, (2) Non-interpersonal sadness aka imagining the loss of the participant’s own eyesight, (3) Neutral aka imagining themselves going grocery shopping, as well as two listening strategies — (1) listening to music that they self identify as comforting and (2) listening to music they self identify as distracting. The study found that regardless of the listener’s mood (interpersonally sad, non-interpersonally sad, or neutral) or the applied listening strategy (comfort or distraction), participants reported a significant loneliness reduction after privately engaging with their self-selected pieces of music for 20 minutes, and that neither of the 6 conditions made any relevant difference in results.

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Figure 2: Mean Loneliness Before & After Private Listening Session

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Source: Sage Publication

 

Music as ambient noise

Music takes advantage of our association between liveliness/ vibrance and noise, especially important to prevent loneliness of those who are in settings of interpersonal solitude, such as prisons, quarantine units, or do not get daily, meaningful, in person interactions. An expansive 2,219 participant - 12 experiments, multinational study was conducted in 2021 in response to COVID-19 isolation, and found that loud noises made people feel both physically and socially closer to others (Wang 4). University student participants were randomly assigned to listen to a clip (meant for background noise) in either the loud condition: “loudest volume possible without it being uncomfortable,” or the quiet condition: “quietest volume possible without it being incomprehensible”. To measure physical proximity, participants were asked to imagine they were at the center of a sphere, and told to guess how many people they believed were, at that moment, within a 30 meter radius of them. For social proximity, they were also asked to self nominate anyone and rate how close they were to said individual using two circles on a 7-point scale (1 - having the least overlap to 7 = two circles completely overlapped on top of one another) (IJzerman et al., 2018; IJzerman & Semin, 2009).  Those in the loud condition reported a significantly larger number of people with 30 meters (mean: 77.24 people compared to 28.98 people), as well as a significantly larger overlap with their self selected person (mean score: 4.22 compared to 3.4). Therefore, higher volume does make people feel as if there are more people within reach and either reminds them of people whom they share a closer relationship to or makes it easier for them to feel emotional closer to others. 

This is because loudness activates subconscious interpersonal closeness associations, which is evidenced by two other experiments, one involving lexical decision tasks (measuring people’s reaction times to words related to closeness) and the other involving implicit association tasks where the clip is replaced with “background noise” of an operating air conditioner. Both of them reaffirm that only those with strong loudness- closeness implicit associations showed significantly higher perceived physical and social proximity scores under the loud condition. This goes to show that music and background noise can influence feelings of social intimacy. The implications of this are huge: that exposure to loud, ambient music is a plausible cost-free, loneliness mitigating strategy. 

 

Music develops opportunities for social interaction

Now, moving from passive to active music related interventions, active music interventions go beyond music listening to actively engaging with the music. For example, song writing or playing music. These are often administered programmatically in group settings, which typically grant participants more opportunity for regular social interaction. In a 2020 systematic review of 68 studies on loneliness interventions for non elderly adults, 59 studies (86.8%) used some group intervention in their methodology, suggesting that researchers consider this an essential component of decreasing perceived loneliness (Bessaha 11). A group component can introduce participants to new contacts, create a sense of belongingness in a facilitated space which will help with social self esteem, and help mitigate the loneliness instinct to withdraw from relationships through regularity of meetings. The importance of this is further bolstered by research that shows that those who have daily, meaningful in person interactions² have an average loneliness score that is 20 points lower than those who do not.

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Music programs help participants recognize maladaptive social cognition

Combining cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and music therapy in helping individuals with clinical (depression, anxiety disorders, phobias, post-traumatic stress disorder, sleep disorders, and eating disorders) and non-clinical problems (social isolation and emotional distress) has been proven to be a powerful prescription for loneliness. Out of a meta-analysis of 20 randomized intervention trials, researchers from the University of Chicago concluded that CBT worked the best, due to how it empowers patients to both acknowledge and cope with the irrational, negative thoughts about self-worth and others’ perception of them that cause loneliness in the first place (Masi 38). These strategies are thus more helpful than ones meant to work on social skills and improve social support as they deal with the negative thoughts that underpin the vicious loneliness feedback cycle. The addition of music therapy makes the CBT program much more robust as multiple studies have shown that active music therapy increases both attendance and engagement for group CBT (Dingle 6). Interacting with music is fun and creates the retention and engagement that is most important to reach full program potential!

 

Section 3: Music Programs for Lonely 18-22 year olds in Action Now and How to Improve Them

 

Loneliness Awareness Campaigns 

Project Unlonely and The Foundation for Arts and Healing have teamed up on Campus Unlonely, an awareness campaign of the normality of loneliness for young adults pursuing higher education, a period of major environmental transition as university students move away from home to campus life. Programs they sponsor include creativity circles that include but are not limited to music, in which facilitators engage students with check ins on stress management (mindfulness), creative expression projects, and group discussions/reflections (socio-emotional learning). They also host an Unlonely Film Festival and Story Fest that features short films to reduce the stigma surrounding conversations of loneliness. 

 

While the creativity circles’ discussion and mindfulness components do take from CBT, the program could be made even more effective by focusing discussions on the development of self regulating strategies to cope with immediate negative thoughts experienced outside of the creativity circle. In addition, story fest can and should extend its format beyond a call to create films, to pieces of music about the experience of loneliness or coping with it, as previously discussed studies have shown the validity of music being able to act as a social surrogate. As Campus Unlonely expands its reach, these songs could act as a preliminary buffer until students can get more involved in one of their programs administered through partners.

 

Internet Based Strategies 

On this note of online material to either distract or comfort loneliness, let us turn to the plethora of internet based loneliness interventions. Three interventions (Bouwman et al. 2017; Shaw and Gant 2002; Williams 2006) tested if developing online relationships had any spillover effects on perceived loneliness and social networks in real life. Two of these three did find an association between making an internet friend and perceived reductions in loneliness (Bouwman et al. 2017; Shaw and Gant 2002)! This evidence supports interventions such as online group music making games or music exchange forums, which have yet to be studied in depth but would have sweeping implications if found effective because of how easily accessible such treatments would be; think of how effortless and cost free creating/joining a loneliness music discussion forum or pairing people who want to work on music together virtually would be. 

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Therapeutic Songwriting/ Music Making

There is, however, research for students ages 18 and older writing lyrics together, which comes from a study called “Blue Notes,” attempting to use therapeutic songwriting to improve student mental health. Therapeutic songwriting is defined as “the process of creating, notating and/or recording lyrics and music by the client(s) and therapist within a therapeutic relationship to address psychosocial, emotional, cognitive, and communication needs of the client.” The sample size of 68 students, all of whom self-identified as, “stressed, anxious, or depressed” (previously mentioned correlates of loneliness), wrote and recorded two songs over 5 two hour long weekly sessions. They were asked to create songs about their current sense of self and wellbeing at university and their hopes for their future self, in the hopes of having students simultaneously work together and still be able to explore their own sense of selves. At the end of the program, their social connection scores via the UCLA loneliness scale and the Friendship Item Scale (FIS) increased significantly (UCLA lowered and FIS increased). 

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Music Interventions for Marginalized Groups

Cultural and/or racial othering, as well as exclusion due to a disability often causes situational and internal loneliness. These marginalized groups in particular can benefit from more specific active music making programs for their group, which in this way, brings together people with these shared experiences of discrimination or ostrazation, justifies their experiences, and gives them a sense of belonging to reduce loneliness. The curriculum of these types of programs must be extremely culturally/ racially/ group specific. Examples might include hip hop and empowerment programs for black college students, or a making music from the east program for students of East Asian descent. This may include writing rap lyrics, beat making, melody composition, music production, and discussion. Studies have shown the potential of such interventions for middle school aged black children, but no research in the music realm has been done with college students. 

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Music Interventions for Incarcerated young adults (including Choirs)

Incarcerated adults are also extremely susceptible to loneliness due to their isolative prison environment. Thus, prison music programs are a most direct link between loneliness correlates and music as an intervention. Out of the 49 prison arts projects compiled in The Prison Arts Resource Project, 18 of these involve music as at least one of the artforms inmates engage with as part of their treatment (see appendix for a systematic review of these 18 prison music programs). 5 of these studies were choral studies, 2 of these were exclusively guitar studies, and the other 11 were mixed arts programs that incorporated music as a crucial part of the curriculum. Incredibly, 33% (6 projects) of these found a measured increase in self-esteem, self-worth, and self confidence, and another 44% (8 projects) found a measured increase in self discipline as demonstrated by a lower infracture/ disciplinary action rate, attendance, and self reported self-control. Many participants of these music based projects also reported less racial tension in correctional facilities and rated their social skills as higher at the end of the program, either a signal of increased confidence in social skills due to increased social opportunity or actual social skills developed over the duration of the program. Cohen’s 2021 study also showed that community and staff impressions of participating inmates, when measured after the program, also significantly improved, as previously held stereotypes against the incarcerated were challenged (appendix 12).

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Boston University’s Choral and orchestral conductor, André de Quadros, explains the key to BU’s prison arts education program as, “Creating a space for them to express themselves meaningfully...It’s about empowerment, personal expression, and community, within a context that is highly racialized,” not so much about getting them to sing in tune or play on time. Much of his research also hinges on the power of music being able to “symbolically remove... barriers between people.” Clearly, there is much promise for music interventions in prisons, which serve to both at building self confidence and to also diffuse tensions between staff and inmates, and many correctional facilities to administer it to. A survey conducted in 2008 of 175 correctional facilities showed that 42.86% had no arts programming whatsoever²⁰, likely an underestimate as arts surveys tend to attract the participation of correctional facilities that have arts programs and are therefore more receptive to fill out a questionnaire about them.

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A suggestion for the expansion of the prison music programs would again be to incorporate CBT alongside it, to learn to recognize and take away the power from any negative thoughts of self esteem and self worth as they come up. Another suggestion is to add ambient background noise to jail cells as a protective mechanism against loneliness.

Conclusion: This paper has made a case for the need for loneliness interventions for Generation Z, through the discussion of the CIGMA loneliness index and loneliness as a precursor for many mental health illnesses. It has also demonstrated the power of music as an intervention for loneliness through both empirical studies and current programs (including a systematic review of music programs in prison systems), and made suggestions for further subareas of academic research (music internet based strategies, and interventions for marginalized college students) as well as suggestions to increase the effectiveness of each program. Founder of the Unloneliness Project, Dr. Nobel, says it best: “Loneliness saps vitality, impairs productivity and diminishes enjoyment of life,” but is also a state of being, not a fundamental trait, and as such, can and should be treated with music, which I truly believe can capture the essence of human experience that loneliness isolates you from.

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Bibliography

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Auditory Neuroscience Featured Neuroscience Psychology. May 25, 2021, et al. “Feeling Lonely? Turn up the Volume!” Neuroscience News, 25 May 2021, neurosciencenews.com/social-isolation-noise-18498/.

Barth, Tommy, et al. “How One BU Researcher Is Empowering Prisoners with Music.” Boston University, 26 Aug. 2020, www.bu.edu/articles/2020/how-one-bu-researcher-is-empowering-prisoners-with-music/.

Bessaha, Melissa L., et al. “A Systematic Review of Loneliness Interventions among Non-Elderly Adults.” Clinical Social Work Journal, vol. 48, no. 1, 2019, pp. 110–125., doi:10.1007/s10615-019-00724-0.

Bouwman, Tamara E., et al. “Does Stimulating Various Coping Strategies Alleviate Loneliness? Results from an Online Friendship Enrichment Program.” Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, vol. 34, no. 6, 2016, pp. 793–811., doi:10.1177/0265407516659158.

Cacioppo, John T., et al. “Loneliness within a Nomological Net: An Evolutionary Perspective.” Journal of Research in Personality, vol. 40, no. 6, 2006, pp. 1054–1085., doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2005.11.007.

DINGLE, GENEVIEVE A., et al. “Can Music Therapy Engage Patients in Group Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Substance Abuse Treatment?” Drug and Alcohol Review, vol. 27, no. 2, 2008, pp. 190–196., doi:10.1080/09595230701829371.

Gardner, Amanda, et al. “PRISON ARTS RESOURCE PROJECT; An Annotated Bibliography.” Arts.gov, May 2014, www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/Research-Art-Works-Oregon-rev.pdf.

Gee, Kate A., et al. “Blue Notes: Using Songwriting to Improve Student Mental Health and Wellbeing. A Pilot Randomised Controlled Trial.” Frontiers, Frontiers, 1 Jan. 1AD, www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00423/full.

Lee, C.J., et al. Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 40, 2013, pp. 382–391.

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Theorell, Töres. “Stress and Music.” SpringerBriefs in Psychology, 2014, pp. 9–16., doi:10.1007/978-94-017-8920-2_2.

Tiwari, Sarvada Chandra. “Loneliness: A Disease?” Indian Journal of Psychiatry, Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd, Oct. 2013, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3890922/.

Wallmark, Zachary, et al. “Neurophysiological Effects of Trait Empathy in Music Listening.” Frontiers, Frontiers, 1 Jan. 1AD, www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbeh.2018.00066/full.

Wang, Deming, et al. “Loudness Perceptions Influence Feelings of Interpersonal Closeness and Protect against Detrimental Psychological Effects of Social Exclusion.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 2021, doi:10.1177/01461672211015896.

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Appendix: 18 Prison Music Intervention Programs 

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Source: The Prison Arts Resource Project

3 - Brewster, L. (2010). The California arts-in-corrections music programme: A qualitative study. International Journal of Community Music, 3(1), 33-46.

• qualitative, guitar building

• increased self discipline, self-esteem, self-respect, sense of purpose, and reconnection with family as a result of the program. Participants also reported reduced racial tension in the correctional facility.

5 - Brewster, L. (1983). An Evaluation of the Arts-in-Corrections Program of the California Department of Corrections. Santa Cruz, CA: William James Association

• Quantitative, mixed arts

• 35.9% of the AIC participants at the California Medical Facility and 65.7% of those at the Correctional Training Facility had fewer disciplinary actions while participating in the program (p. 29). Saves taxpayer money

6 - Brewster, L. (2010). A Qualitative Study of the California Arts-in-Corrections Program. Santa Cruz, CA: William James Association.

• Qualitative, mixed arts

• Inmates revealed that participation in the AIC program enhanced their self-esteem, work ethic, discipline and identity as artists. All interviewees successfully completed parole, and 31% (5 of 16) self-identify as artists, earning all or part of their living through art.

7 - California Department of Corrections. (n.d.). Arts-in-Corrections Research Synopsis on Parole Outcomes for Participants Paroled December 1980-February 1987. Santa Cruz, CA: William James Association Prison Arts Program. Retrieved from:http://www.williamjamesassociation.org/reports/CDC-A IC_recitivism_research_synopsis.pdf

• Quantitative, mixed arts

• Six months after parole AIC participants showed an 88% rate of favorable outcomes (no parole difficulties, technical parolee infractions, misdemeanor convictions only)

9 - Cohen, M.L., (2009). Choral singing and prison inmates: influences of performing in a prison choir. Journal of Correctional Education. 60(1), 52-65.

• Quantitative, choir

• Significant differences between experimental and control groups with experimental group showing improvements on four subscales: emotional stability, sociability, happiness and joviality.

11 - Cohen, M.L. ( 2007). Explorations of inmate and volunteer choral experiences among a prison-based choir. Australian Journal of Music Education, 1, 61-72.

• Quantitative & Qualitative, choir

• Both inmates and volunteers indicated that their participation afforded: “(a) means to a peak experience with momentary disappearance of stresses and (b) a sense of accomplishment. Inmates perceived more improvement in intrapersonal skills than volunteers while volunteers reported more success in identifying out-of-tune singing than inmates”

12 - Cohen, M.L. (2012) Harmony within the walls: Perceptions of worthiness and competence in a community prison choir. International Journal of Music Education, 30(1), 46-55.

• Quantitative & Qualitative, choir

• The data indicates that participation in the choir had a positive impact on the community members’ attitude toward the inmates, changing previously held stereotypes. Open-ended responses from inmates revealed they felt respected, made friends, increased connections outside the prison, and improved family relationships. 

20 - Halperin, R., Kessler, S. & Braunschweiger, D. (April 2012). Rehabilitation Through the Arts: Impact on Participants' Engagement in Educational Programs. The Journal of Correctional Education, 63(1), 6-23.

• Quantitative, mixed arts

• Virtually all respondents viewed the arts programs positively, reporting that they reduced tension within the institution, enhanced interpersonal and vocational skills for inmate and ex-inmate participants and strengthened the participants’ self-confidence and expanded their range of options in dealing with their world, both inside the institution and after release.

29 - Worrall J., & Koines, M. (1978). Project CULTURE. Alexandria, VA: American Correctional Association.

• Quantitative & Qualitative, choir

• Evaluations were conducted at the following four facilities: California Institution for Women at Fontera, New Jersey Correctional Institution for Women (CIW), Sheridan Correctional Center, Oklahoma Prison Arts Program in five state institutions: McAlester, Granite, McLeod, Quachita and Strongtown

• Increased discipline, commitment, creative self-expression, self-worth and sense of accomplishment.

30 - Baker, S. and Homan, S. (2007). Rap, Recidivism and the Creative Self: A Popular Music Programme for Young Offenders in Detention. Journal of Youth Studies, 10, (4), 459-476.

• Qualitative, piano, guitar, rap and sequencing lessons

• improved participants’ organizational skills, self-esteem, self-control, focus and sense of achievement

31 - Center for the Study of Art & Community. [n.d]. CORE Arts Program Report: 1999-2007. Prepared for the Mississippi Arts 37 Commission by the Center for the Study of Art & Community. Retrieved from http://www.arts.ms.gov/programs/documents/coreartsrev.p df

• Quantitative & Qualitative, mixed art

• 71% improvement in attendance (p. 18). ● 58% reduction in referrals for behavioral problems (p. 18). ● Counselor ratings were 5.07% higher than during the three prior months of regular program offerings (p. 18). ● Positive correlation between time spent in program and improved attitudes and behavior. ● Improved overall academic performance. Enhanced self-control and cooperation. ● Decreased violent behavior and idle time. ● Reduced tensions between students and staff. ● Improved communication, planning and cooperation between staff members. ● 86% of participating artists reported positive impact on them and their work. ● Improved program work environments

33 - Cleveland, W. (2001). An evaluation of the Jackson County Children’s Services Coalition Core Arts Program 2001-2002. Minneapolis, MN: Center for the Study of Art & Community.

• Quantitative & Qualitative, mixed art

• 15% improvement in participants’ grade averaged compared with pre-program performance. ● Improvements in student behavior including cooperation and self-control. ● 58% reduction in behavior referrals compared to pre-program performance. ● Student interest in other programs.

34 - Ezell, M., & Levy, M. (2003). An Evaluation of an Arts Program for Incarcerated Juvenile Offenders. Journal of Correctional Education, 54(3), 108-114.

• Quantitative & Qualitative, mixed art

• Second and Third Year Findings: 63% reduction in behavioral incidents pre-workshops versus during workshops ○ Of 24 youth followed for recidivism, 16.7% recidivated within six months versus 32.9% for a control group of youth released in 1992.

35 - Kennedy, J. R. (2002). The Effects of Musical Performance, Rational Emotive Therapy and Vicarious Experience on the Self-Efficacy and Self-Esteem of Juvenile Delinquents and Disadvantaged Children. In Deasy, Richard J., (Ed.), Critical Links: Learning in the Arts and Student Academic and Social Development. Washington, DC: Arts Education Partnership, pp 119-120.

• Quantitative, guitar

• “The study demonstrated that guitar training coupled with repeated performance experiences improves both musical self-efficacy and self-esteem of these youth” (p. 119). ​​The study further suggests that “music training improves self esteem because the opportunity to perform helps youth overcome fears and helps them see that they can succeed” (p. 119).

39 - Maschi, T., Miller, J., Rowe, W., and Morgen, K. (2013). An Evaluation of a Cultural Arts Program for Youth in a Juvenile Justice Program: Technical Report. National Endowment for the Arts working paper. Retrieved from http://arts.gov/artistic-fields/research-analysis/research-artworks-grants-final-papers

• quantitative, mixed arts

• Trends towards improvement (especially in females) but no significant differences in pre and post-test between groups in social skills or mental health improvement. The authors conclude that “a short term art program impact on social skills and mental health is modest at best” (p. 31).

40 - Nelson, D. (1997). High-risk adolescent males, self-efficacy, and choral performance: An investigation. Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ

• qualitative, choral

• Participants reported that performing in the choir was a special experience, that moments in the choir were “wonderful, difficult to verbalize and . . . deeply personal” (p. iv). They also reported that the relationships developed in choir were different than those with other residents of the facility.

42 - Rapp-Paglicci, L., Stewart, C., and Rowe, W. S. (Winter 2009). Evaluating the Effects of the Prodigy Cultural Arts Program on Symptoms of Mental Health Disorders in At-Risk and Adjudicated Youths. Best Practices in Mental Health: An International Journal, 5(1), 65-73.

• quasi experimental, mixed arts

• Significant decrease in symptoms of mental health disorders, notably anger/irritability and anxiety/depression.

45 - Stewart, C., Rapp-Paglicci, L., and Rowe, W. (2009) Evaluating the efficacy of the Prodigy prevention program across urban and rural locales. Child & Adolescent Social Work Journal, 26(1), 65-75.

• quantitative, mixed arts

• Significant improvement in family functioning overall. ● Statistically significant changes in mental health symptoms including depression/anxiety, somatic and suicidal symptoms for both males and females