Contemporary Art Therapy with Adolescents - Chapter Summaries
- Tiffany Tong
- Dec 5, 2017
- 10 min read
Chapter 1 - Integrating Developmental Theories with Art Expressions
Shirley Riley begins her book with introducing the general concepts of art-therapy for adolescents. Most of this chapter focuses on the adolescent apart from therapy, but also integrates some media that the adolescent can use in therapy. The most important topic that Riley discusses in the first chapter of the book, in my opinion, is the importance of recognizing the influences that surround the adolescent. Environments vary as much as the type of adolescents that may come into therapy, so it is important to take into account the different social norms and pressures of each client. It’s also essential to know that although the environment can affect the adolescent, the adolescent can impact the environment as well, creating a cycle of evolution of standards and norms. Aside from external influences, it is also important to consider what occurs on the inside of the adolescent. An individual goes through many different stages of development, and it’s critical to assess the client for their correlating development stage. Knowing the influential factors outside and inside the adolescent are crucial to effective therapy. Art, overall, is a way for clients to project themselves and their feelings into something visual. Although it is not verbal, it is a universal language than can be understood by the therapist.
In this chapter, Shirley Riley, starts to mention the different kinds of media that she uses in therapy session with adolescents. The one that stood out to me most was collage. Personally. I do not have much experience with collage as an art student. However, I had recently attended an expressive therapies summit and had learned about collage there. Collage is a flexible medium, which means that the structure of it is not confined to any standards or expectations. This allows the adolescent to freely express their inventiveness and creativity. Adolescents, at this point in time, are in the most creative period of their lives, so collage is a great way for them to express their individuality. Although it is important to have a different selection of media to work with in the art-therapy environment, collage is one of the most used mediums.
Chapter 2 - Adolescent Group Treatment
In Chapter 2 of the book, Riley explains the concept and use of adolescent group treatment. There seems to be some difficulties with using group therapy specifically with adolescents, but once the therapy-client relationship has been established, I think that group therapy could be very useful in helping larger amounts of adolescents. One of the benefits that come with working in groups, is that more clients can be treated and reached out to simultaneously. It is also a good way for adolescents to interact with peers who are like them. Much thought goes into forming therapy groups that are made up of similar individuals. Some things that are considered when constructing these groups are different age groups, ethnic and cultural groups, and gender identity. Individuals feel more comfortable sharing with those that are like them, so group therapy is a great way for adolescents to interact with others.
Another important part of using group therapy with adolescents is keeping in mind the change in teen culture over time. When societal changes occur, it’s important for the therapy to evolve with it since it suggests a change in what’s psychologically important to the adolescent. Sometimes, when teens first begin therapy, they may not want to share in group because their behavior may not seem “cool” to others. However, art-therapy helps the adolescent communicate with the therapist non-verbally and hopefully, over time, the group will be able to come to understand one another.
Some parents may not like group therapy if they feel inadequate as parents. If their kid is impressionable, they may feel that they may be influenced by disturbed peers, so sometimes parents do not wish for their children to participate in group therapy. However, it’s important to keep the group a safe space, both physically and emotionally safe, so encouraging the parent that the therapy is a safe environment for their developing adolescent should assure them of what they worry about.
Chapter 3 - Adolescence Depression, and the Impact of Societal Issues
Chapter 3 discusses depression in adolescents and how art-therapy can benefit those who struggle with depression. Riley mentions masked depression which manifest in forms of fatigue, restless boredom, poor school performance, somatic symptoms, and reckless behavior. Depression can be increased by depressed parents, substance abuse, and abusive families; however the environment may influence the adolescent, the depression reflects the reality of that environment.
Art-therapy is great for adolescents with depression since adolescents are very creative. As mentioned before, adolescents are in their most creative part of their lives, so it’s important to stress the importance of adolescent creativity and encouraging them to freely express themselves. Although depression may be the antithesis of creativity, art-therapy aids the functioning of creativity and allows the adolescent to control their own behavior. It’s also extremely important to be attentive when signs of suicide appear in the client’s artwork. The overall goal for adolescents with depression is to guide the client to exercise maturation and self-confidence.
Chapter 4 - Severely Damaged Adolescents in Residential and Therapeutic School Settings
Chapter 4 was interesting from the previous three chapters since it was formatted differently; Shirley Riley interviews two other art therapists, Aimee Loth and Roberta Lengua, that work with severely damaged adolescents in residential and therapeutic settings rather than giving her own perspective on the subject. Riley does not work in the same setting as Loth and Lengua, so the explanations of working with adolescents in these specific settings are based on first-hand experience. Riley stressed at the beginning of the chapter that since therapy is personalized for each individual, there is no single “right” way to practice. However, since there are many different demographics of clients a therapist can work with, it’s important for the therapist to find a setting that compliments the therapy style of your own. Loth and Lengua had found their styles working with damaged adolescents specifically in residential settings where Riley may not work as much with this specific demographic in her own work.
Many aspects and preferences in working with teens in residential settings were similar in between the interviews with Aimee Loth and Roberta Lengua. One specific discussion I found particularly interesting was the preference of evaluating process or product. Both therapists, when asked if they prefer to evaluate the process or product of the artwork, chose process. Many of the adolescents that Loth and Lengua work with come from abusive families or families with abusive histories. This ultimately causes the individual to feel separated from others and may not receive the support they need from their parents. Choosing to evaluate the process may show more about what the teen is going through in comparison to evaluating the product. The process of creating the art, allows the individual to create the atmosphere of the therapy. The art is abstract and unstructured, so it allows the teen to be autonomous and make decisions for themselves in terms of what they want out of therapy. Giving an adolescent client autonomy gives them freedom which is something they might not feel with their family or even other therapists if they have been “therapized” often previously.
If the teen has been through many other therapists and/or has seen many different social workers, they might feel as though the system is trying to pry them open and infiltrate their minds. Art therapy is not a familiar process to these adolescents, so they aren’t so defended against it since it is something they are not used to participating in. The process of creating art as therapy also allows the client to be nonverbal if they wish. Even if they choose to not speak, the art and the process of creating is a way to communicate with the therapist.
Overall, I thought this chapter was very interesting. It shows that there are many different ways one can approach the art therapy process and that it can be individualized to the adolescent’s needs. There is no one “right” way to therapy, so I think that as a student, it’s important to focus on what my specific style is in terms of the demographic of individuals I want to work with in the future and gear my attention and efforts towards treating those individuals.
Chapter 5 - Adolescents and Their Families
Although most of the book mentions the importance of family relations especially during the time of the child’s development throughout their adolescence, Chapter 5 highlighted the importance of adolescents going to therapy sessions with their families. It is important to understand what the family personally thinks is the problem.
One of the things that stood out to me throughout the chapter was the use of a “family mural.” Each family member is to draw with an individual color and through this process, interpersonal dynamics of each person of the family can be seen through the work. The family mural provides alternative viewpoints as shown through the different markings and colors representing each member of the family. It can show the family structure and what position each person holds in the family. This approach in art-therapy, like many others, is non-verbal. It uses the “not knowing” approach: since art expressions and art as therapy are new to the members of the family, they are not expecting what the therapy is like, so the more likely they are to subconsciously share through their artwork what is happening in the family.
Another interesting thing that I read about in the chapter was the use of art in determining how developed and mature an individual is psychologically in comparison to their chronological and physical age. Using art to determine psychological age is very interesting because an art therapist can assess a client and create a type of milieu specific to the age of the individual, making the therapy more efficient and geared toward the client and their specific needs.
I think the most important part of this chapter as a whole is about the clarification of communication in between individuals in problematic families. I learned that there is a difference between empty threats a parent makes is different from solidified statements and that it is important during therapy for parents to solidify what they mean when communicating with their adolescents. Threats can cause and increase chaos and distress between family members while statements are confrontive. It is important for things to be understood clearly for therapy to be able to progress.
Chapter 6 - How Therapies Get Tangled Up in Adolescent Treatment
Chapter 6 mainly focuses on the ethics in therapy. Shirley Riley stresses the importance of separating work from what we believe in our own personal lives and how we should act when faced with difficult situations in therapy. This chapter in particular stood out to me because I had just learned about ethics and legal issues in a previous lecture of one of my psychology classes not too long ago, so many of the things that Riley highlights wasn’t new information to me.
A common difficulty that may arise during therapy with an adolescent is not being seen as someone trying to help them. Sometimes the individual is forced to go to therapy and their reluctance can cause a disregard for respect that the therapist owns. One of the big focuses in art therapy practice, is transference, which is the feelings a therapist can evoke in the client. However, countertransference, which is what the client makes the therapist feel, can also have a big impact on how the therapist perceive the client and the addresses situation. Difficult clients can frustrate the therapist, but instead of confronting difficult clients because we are frustrated with them, it is better to provide feedback and show that we want to help the adolescent. In order to understand clients more thoroughly, Riley states that it is essential to acknowledge personal biases. What we think may not be what the adolescent thinks about their current situation and it’s important to understand the client in order to avoid misinterpretation. It’s easy to make quick and irrational decisions based off of what we personally believe, so we must recognize the difference between the variety of biases others can have.
One of the things that has been drawing my attention is the subject of self-care in the psychology/therapy profession. In order to be a therapist and work with individuals that have psychological situations that need addressing, the therapist themself must be free of psychological disturbance. Riley mentions something along the lines of compassion fatigue. In art therapy, since many aspects are visual, a lot of emotionally heavy imagery that stays in memory for a long time. Another person’s emotional weight can make the therapist weary, so taking care of their own stress is critical to being able to care for another person.
Although success is something that art therapists strive for when treating clients, Riley mentions that it is okay to not always expect constant success. Difficult clients can either cause the therapist to choose to struggle until things change in the system of treatment or seek support from others while acknowledging their own frustration. Although they may prefer to choose the route that leads to most success, it’s important for the therapist to practice self care and realize that success isn’t always guaranteed.
Chapter 7 - Short-Term, Solution Focused, Art Therapy Treatment
Chapter 7 discusses the short-term therapy approach. In short-term therapy, the therapist and the adolescent focus on the “here and now” and work on taking small steps in order to generate small successes. Some adolescents may be unwilling to participate in therapy and may think that therapy will not work for them, but these small successes can encourage unwilling adolescents to continue with therapy. What is also great about short-term therapy with adolescents is that it’s considered “not so serious” which allows the adolescent to become more comfortable sharing and the dialogue to become more greatly enhanced. Something that came up during my reading was the question of whether or not the concepts behind short-term therapy derive from a humanistic approach. Since short-term therapy focuses on the well-being of the client, it resembles much of the concepts of the humanistic theory.
The major difficulty with short-term therapy, though, is that parents or clients may only be expecting a “quick fix” rather than personal development. This puts pressure on the therapist to do well and may tempt the clinician to change the structure of the therapy. Although time is short, there still must be time allotted to focusing on the client’s immediate distress.
One of the major things that had stood out to me throughout this chapter was the concept of reframing. Reframing is used in short-term therapy to help the client create a different way of interpreting a situation, person, or relationship by changing its meaning. In short, it’s a way to positively changed the adolescent’s outlook on life. The adolescent may not understand the certain things that happen around them, so reframing is a way where the therapist and the client can work on clearing up confusion and redefining specific situations that may have been interpreted differently. Some things may have had a positive intention, but the result could have otherwise be interpreted differently or vice versa, so using reframing is an effective way of helping the adolescent understand the events that go on around them.
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