Читать книгу The Creative Arts in Counseling - Samuel Gladding T., Samuel T. Gladding - Страница 51

In addition to being therapeutic for adolescents, rap therapy is beneficial for adults. For instance, Hakvoort (2015) found several benefits using rap in therapy to reduce anxiety and to improve emotional regulation and impulsivity with an incarcerated population diagnosed with various psychiatric or psychological disorders. Likewise, in a limited qualitative study using person-centered groups of prisoners, A. Richards et al. (2019) found that when elements of rap music were integrated into the therapeutic process, participants self-reported reduced feelings of anxiety, more autonomy, a great sense of identity, a strong connection to others, and improved happiness. Creating a beat to represent their emotions and experiences made it easier for many participants to speak as well as connect with and feel heard by others.

Music also makes a difference in reducing post-meal-related anxiety for adults with eating disorders (Bibb et al., 2019). In a study of 13 adult women in an outpatient facility who attended a 1-hour music therapy group following a lunchtime social eating challenge, anxiety decreased significantly. Group members chose, sang, listened to, and discussed familiar songs together from a songbook that included 50–60 popular songs. Their engagement in singing and talking focused their attention on their relationship with the music and not on their problems with eating, a strategy they could use after treatment.

Other research has suggested that in addition to offering adults sounds to relax by, music enhances movement (Park et al., 2019). Therefore, adults who are athletes or who regularly exercise can enhance their efforts by coordinating their physical movement with certain sounds. These positive effects occur because music either distracts people by causing them to selectively focus on pleasant stimuli or physically inhibits negative feedback transmissions (i.e., fatigue) because of the pleasurable electrosensory reactions it generates. Music is a prime ingredient in helping people physically and mentally maintain health or rehabilitate.

Another important function music plays in the lives of adults is enhancing experiences for them. Childbirth preparation is often linked with relaxing and soothing music that makes delivery, recovery, and bonding stronger. The type of exhilaration that results makes intra-personal and interpersonal relationships better. It promotes growth to the fullest. Other marker events in the lives of adults are equally enhanced through music. As Virginia Perry, a counselor in North Carolina, wrote about a workshop she attended in which each session was introduced by music, “He sings, and I forget myself. We move, one through another, vibrating the resonances of soul. These connected hearts and voices remain beyond time and place” (personal communication, July 19, 1991).