Between March 11, 2020 and May of 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) counted over 100 million cases of COVID-19, resulting in three million deaths worldwide (WHO, 2021). In order to examine the effects of art-making on social and psychological well-being, seven graduate students from the Marital and Family Art Therapy Program at LMU conducted the following study utilizing a qualitative, arts-based research approach through collaborative autoethnography (CAE). The research question — What are the effects of personal art-making on well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic? — was posed by the seven graduate student authors. The data revealed that pandemic-time art-making impacted well-being through three primary avenues: by acting as a means to cope, to adapt, and to process. Each of our emerging themes highlighted the use of art-making as a tool, and each theme described this phenomenon in a unique and pointed way. First, our art-making impacted our well-being during the pandemic by serving as a tool to cope with the stressors of the pandemic by minimizing, banishing, or making them tolerable. Going one step further than coping, art-making also served as a tool for adapting. It acted as the mediating force between the pandemic’s external impacts and our ensuing internal experiences. Finally, art-making impacted well-being throughout the pandemic by serving as a tool to process corporeal experiences, emotional experiences, and other personal realities. In order to build upon our findings, we propose future research on the impacts of personal art-making on wellness through collaborative autoethnography by participant-researchers representing diverse cultures within their social and environmental contexts.
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:lmu.edu/oai:digitalcommons.lmu.edu:etd-1960 |
Date | 01 April 2021 |
Creators | Carey, Caitlin, Frost, Parisa, Harguindeguy, Jon, Heller, Sarah, Lee, Susan, Smith, Christina, Wang, Eva |
Publisher | Digital Commons at Loyola Marymount University and Loyola Law School |
Source Sets | Loyola Marymount University |
Detected Language | English |
Type | text |
Format | application/pdf |
Source | LMU/LLS Theses and Dissertations |
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