Date of Award
Spring 5-18-2024
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
MAE - Master of Arts in Expressive Therapies
Department
Expressive Therapies
Advisor
Basel Zayed
Abstract
The benefits of therapeutic songwriting (TS) in the context of music therapy sessions are well-documented. As music therapists are sometimes given brief periods in which to work, a method of therapeutic songwriting wherein the music therapist divides the writing process into multiple short sessions would be useful. This capstone thesis details the development of such a method. The researcher enacted this method with a group of youth who participated in an arts program in Massachusetts that utilized a resource-oriented approach. After each TS session, the researcher recorded the participants' reactions to the intervention's application. The researcher coded the reactions using inductive analysis and found themes. Results indicated that the most common reactions of the participants were engagement and pleasure. As resource-oriented music therapy counts engagement and pleasure among its aims, the researcher concluded that the developed method had potential benefits as a TS intervention. Quantitative research into the relative efficacy of short and long-session songwriting interventions and task-divided (TD) and full songwriting sessions is recommended.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
schwartz, eric, "Development of a Method of Short-Session, Task-Divided Therapeutic Songwriting" (2024). Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses. 838.
https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/expressive_theses/838
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