Date of Award

Spring 3-19-2026

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Expressive Therapies

First Advisor

Robyn Cruz

Abstract

Graduate students experience disproportionately high levels of stress, and when this stress becomes chronic, it is associated with adverse psychological and physical health outcomes. While yoga and art therapy have independently demonstrated potential in reducing stress, their combined effects remain underexplored. This quantitative study employed a two-group experimental design to investigate the synergistic effects of an integrated art therapy and yoga intervention on stress reduction and flow enhancement. Graduate students (N = 23) were randomly assigned to either the integrated intervention or an active control group receiving yoga only. Participants received three weekly 50-min sessions, with pre- and post-intervention measures assessing acute stress and flow. The integrated intervention resulted in significantly greater stress reduction compared to yoga alone. Regarding secondary outcomes, although the intervention group showed a higher mean increase in flow scores than the control group, the difference was not statistically significant. Flow and stress showed a weak negative relationship, suggesting they may represent independent constructs. These findings provide preliminary support for integrating art therapy and yoga as a holistic intervention for stress reduction in higher education, suggesting that this combined approach may serve as a feasible and accessible means of supporting graduate student well-being.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License

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