Date of Award
Spring 5-17-2025
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts in Expressive Therapies
Major
Expressive Therapies
First Advisor
Wendy Allen
Abstract
This thesis explores how intergenerational connections within communities, facilitated through expressive arts, can promote psychosocial development across the lifespan. It is grounded in the theoretical frameworks of Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory and Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological systems Theory, and reviews prior studies based on these theories that highlight the benefits of nurturing intergenerational relationships and collective artistic engagement, but few examine their combined impact, and its elements that lead to an individual's development through community interactions. This project responds to that need through a community-based expressive arts intervention in Greater Boston, involving diverse participants of various ages in collaborative singing and storytelling sessions. The project was intentionally designed around three core elements: collaboration, reciprocity, and accompaniment and key observations included a sense of shared ownership and leadership, especially among youth, a priority to children’s voices in shaping group stories, and signs of increased confidence and connection among all. The findings suggest that expressive arts elements like embodied empathy, aesthetic communication, play, and rhythmic resonance, along with collaboration, reciprocity and accompaniment can serve as a powerful, accessible medium for fostering relational learning and growth in individuals, and while this study offers valuable insights into intergenerational art-making and psychosocial development, it faced limitations including linguistic inaccessibility, sampling bias, group dynamics, and sustainability concerns, highlighting the need for more inclusive, long-term, and community-rooted approaches. This study contributes to the evolving understanding of how arts-based community engagement can decenter an individualistic focus of development to a community-rooted paradigm and move toward a more connected, inclusive, and healing model of human growth.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Jayaprakash, Kavya R., "Nurturing Across Generations: Exploring Expressive Arts with an Emphasis on Collaboration, Reciprocity, and Accompaniment in a Community-Engagement Project for Psychosocial Development" (2025). Expressive Therapies Theses. 55.
https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/expressive_therapies_theses/55
