Comparison of the Effectiveness of Painting Therapy and story Therapy in reducin of the Symptoms of Separation Anxiety disorder in Pre-School Children

The present research has been aimed to compare the effectiveness of painting therapy and narrative therapy in improvement of the symptoms of separation anxiety in pre- school children.

This research is a semi- experimental study with pretest-posttest design and control group. The population includes the children of 5-6 years old in kindergartens of Tehran, District 2 in the academic year 2017-2018. Out of the mentioned population, 215 mothers of the children were selected by convenience sampling. In order to evaluate their children’s separation anxiety, they answered the Gado and Sprafkin child symptom inventory (1994) and Conners’ Comprehensive Behaviour Rating Scales (1991). By convenience sampling, 45 children were selected and randomly assigned to two experimental groups and a control group in an equal manner. The first experimental group (painting therapy) and the second experimental group (narrative therapy) received eight 60-min training sessions, and the control group was kept in the waiting list. Data analysis was done by univariate analysis of variance (ANOVA) and independent t-test in SPSS 22.

The results showed that by controlling the pretest effect, there is a significant difference between the mean posttest scores of the two experimental groups (paining therapy and narrative therapy) and the control group in terms of separation anxiety (P!0.01). Also, a significant difference was found between the effectiveness of the two methods of paining therapy and narrative therapy (P!0.01).

Narratives lead the children towards facing with their anxiety and fears and perceive them as a part of the usual emotions and thoughts instead of escaping from them. In this way, they can express their feelings in a better way. So, the therapists can get a more comprehensive recognition of their thoughts and help them to decrease their separation anxiety.