The psychopathology of everyday art: a quantitative Study - World ...

psychopathology, something which is not at all clear from the controlled studies. The
hypotheses and direction of the controlled studies are often takedn from this collected
experience and there are many assumptions derived from clinical experience which are not
at all obvious, especially in the interpretation of results.
Impressionistic and theoretical studies
Description of the range of studies included in this breakdown
There were 253 general impressionistic papers or papers which reported theories or
personal experiences to show the therapeutic effects or benefits of art. These papers
differed from research studies in that they focused on the explanatory, speculative and
theoretical not the particular. They discussed typical work of patients and tried to
explain their conclusions or argued different theoretical standpoints. The purpose of this
breakdown and analysis was twofold: primarily, to identify the way therapists
considered that art produced by a patient contributed to beneficial change in the patient;
secondarily, to identify the theoretical basis of explanations so that the underlying
concepts may be explored and to test the relationship of explanation or theory to
particular benefits gained.
Characteristics of each paper were summarised. There were 5 categories of
information common to most papers 102 and the discussions centre around the explanation
of the value of art to therapy (complete descriptions of categories appendix 1):
102 A complete description of categories appears in appendix 1.
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