scholarly journals Group Art Therapy, Aesthetic Experiences of Difference and Belonging

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-68
Author(s):  
Sally Schofield

This paper comes from a qualitative doctoral study which explored the impact of group art therapy on people affected by Parkinson’s. It specifically addresses the research question: How might participating in art therapy groups support wellbeing and better functioning for people affected by Parkinson’s? Art therapy is not a widely applied therapeutic intervention for this client population. The study was undertaken at the Catalan Parkinson’s Association which has a long-standing art therapy service integrated into the therapeutic rehabilitation programme. The language-based data gathered for analysis was from four focus group encounters with people affected by Parkinson’s (who had directly experienced group art therapy), family members and professionals from the multidisciplinary team working alongside the art therapist. A thematic network analysis (Attride-Stirling, 2001) was undertaken producing six global themes in response to the research question: self-construction; material action; an aesthetic group movement; new perspectives; artwork as legacy; physical transformation as a relational aesthetic experience. I first describe how the research participants joined the study, the rationale for the focus groups and their composition; followed by a detailed exploration of the six themes, relating them to wider literature and a discussion of their implications for practice.

2019 ◽  
pp. 362-373
Author(s):  
Rebecca Wallbank

What does it mean to say that we appreciate rhythm in literature? To answer this question Chapter 22 adopts a two-fold approach: first, it sheds light on the ways in which readers attend to rhythm in literature, and second, it calls for a re-evaluation of certain common assumptions concerning literary aesthetic experience and appreciation. The chapter analyzes the impact of different forms of attention within aesthetic experiences, and through this aims to expose and enlighten the overlooked roles of rhythmic auditory-imagining within our experiences of literary works.


e-Finanse ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-58
Author(s):  
Marzanna Poniatowicz ◽  
Agnieszka Piekutowska

AbstractThe aim of the paper is to analyse the effects of economic immigration on subnational government finance (SNG) in Poland. The goal to achieve is to answer the following research question: what are the fiscal effects of immigration on SNG budget revenues and expenditures. To answer this question, logarithmic models were developed. The analysis refers to the years 2007-2016. In this respect, data from Statistics Poland - referring to budget revenues and expenditures of communes, cities of district status, districts and voivodeships - were used. As far as immigration statistics are concerned, data from the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy were used. The results indicate an increase in both revenues and expenditures of SNG as a result of immigration. Such results can be explained inter alia by the nature of migration - research were focused on economic immigration. Results confirm that the level of employment of foreigners is one of the determinants shaping the fiscal effect of immigration. Moreover, the impact of economic immigration on SNG budget revenues and expenditures depends on the structure of this budget. This explains the differentiated results of the analysis of the impact of immigration on SNG in different countries. The positive correlation between immigration and SNG revenues in Poland can be associated with a high share of subnational governments in personal income tax revenues as this tax is one of the main categories of SNG revenues. Furthermore, results show that the impact of immigration on local government budgets in Poland is modest. This confirms the conclusions drawn by other authors (e.g. Auerbach and Oreopoulos), that in the long term, immigration cannot be considered as a potential instrument for resolving fiscal imbalances.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 8080
Author(s):  
Maria Grindheim ◽  
Liv Torunn Grindheim

Individuals’ capacities to contribute to more sustainable living are deeply influenced by their early life experiences. Hence, there is a need to discover which experiences are relevant to young children’s contemporary and future contributions to more sustainable living. Perceiving children as aesthetically oriented to the world and their sense of belonging as a core experience for social and cultural sustainability, and using the example of dancing, we investigate how such a sense of belonging can be supported through aesthetic first-person experiences. This article is therefore structured around the following research question: How can adults’ experiences of themselves, others and their sense of belonging—when dancing—inform explorations of ways to foster embodied and aesthetic belonging for social and cultural sustainability in early childhood education (ECE)? Drawing on a phenomenological study, we analyse interviews with four dancers, who differ in age, gender and dance genre. Our analysis reveals their experiences when dancing as being in a meditative state, having a sense of freedom and feeling body and mind as one, described as an overall “different”, resilient way of being and belonging in a social context. Our findings indicate that facilitating moments of sensible and bodily awareness can support a non-verbal understanding of oneself and others, as well as arguments for promoting aesthetic experiences while dancing as relevant to sustainable practices in ECE.


Author(s):  
Catherine Malboeuf-Hurtubise ◽  
Terra Léger-Goodes ◽  
Geneviève A. Mageau ◽  
Geneviève Taylor ◽  
Catherine M. Herba ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Emerging literature on the current COVID-19 crisis suggests that children may experience increased anxiety and depression as a result of the pandemic. To prevent such school and mental health-related problems, there is a timely need to develop preventive strategies and interventions to address potential negative impacts of COVID-19 on children’s mental health, especially in school settings. Results from previous child clinical research indicate that art-based therapies, including mindfulness-based art therapy, have shown promise to increase children’s well-being and reduce psychological distress. Objective The goal of the present pilot and feasibility study was to compare the impact of an emotion-based directed drawing intervention and a mandala drawing intervention, on mental health in elementary school children (N = 22), in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both interventions were group-based and delivered online and remotely. A pilot study using a randomized cluster design was implemented to evaluate and compare both interventions in relation to child anxiety, depression, inattention and hyperactivity symptoms. Results Analyses of covariance revealed a significant effect of the type of drawing intervention on levels of inattention, after controlling for baseline levels. Participants in the emotion-based directed drawing group showed lower inattention scores at post-test, when compared to participants in the mandala group. Post-hoc sensitivity analyses showed significant decreases in pre-to-post scores for levels of hyperactivity for the complete sample. Conclusion Overall, results from this pilot and feasibility study showed that both an emotion-based directed drawing intervention and a mandala drawing intervention may be beneficial to improve mental health in elementary school children, in the context of the current COVID-19 pandemic. From a feasibility standpoint, results indicate that the implementation of both interventions online and remotely, through a videoconference platform, is feasible and adequate in school-based settings. Further work incorporating larger sample sizes, longitudinal data and ensuring sufficient statistical power is warranted to evaluate the long-term impact of both interventions on children’s mental health.


2021 ◽  
Vol 80 (3) ◽  
pp. 1963-1980
Author(s):  
Solomon Adomako ◽  
Christian John Engelsen ◽  
Rein Terje Thorstensen ◽  
Diego Maria Barbieri

AbstractRock aggregates constitute the enormous volume of inert construction material used around the globe. The petrologic description as igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic types establishes the intrinsic formation pattern of the parent rock. The engineering properties of these rocks vary due to the differences in the transformation process (e.g. hydrothermal deposits) and weathering effect. The two most common mechanical tests used to investigate the performance of aggregates are the Los Angeles (LA) and micro-Deval (MD) tests. This study reviewed the geological parameters (including mineralogy, grain and crystal size, grain shape, and porosity) and the relationship to Los Angeles and micro-Deval tests. It was found that high content of primary minerals in rocks (e.g. quartz and feldspar) is a significant parameter for performance evaluation. Traces of secondary and accessory minerals also affect the performance of rocks, although in many cases it is based on the percentage. Furthermore, some studies showed that the effect of mineralogic composition on mechanical strength is not sufficient to draw final conclusions of mechanical performance; therefore, the impact of other textural characteristics should be considered. The disposition of grain size and crystal size (e.g. as result of lithification) showed that rocks composed of fine-grain textural composition of ≤ 1 mm enhanced fragmentation and wear resistance than medium and coarse grained (≥ 1 mm). The effect of grain shape was based on convex and concave shapes and flat and elongated apexes of tested samples. The equidimensional form descriptor of rocks somehow improved resistance to impact from LA than highly flat and elongated particles. Lastly, the distribution of pore space investigated by means of the saturation method mostly showed moderate (R = 0.50) to strong (R = 0.90) and positive correlations to LA and MD tests.


Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 975
Author(s):  
Antonio Copak ◽  
Vlatka Jirouš-Rajković ◽  
Nikola Španić ◽  
Josip Miklečić

Oriented strand board (OSB) is a commonly used structural wood-based panel for walls and roof siding, but recently the industry has become interested in OSB as a substrate for indoor and outdoor furniture. Particleboard is mainly used in furniture productions and has become popular as a construction material due to its numerous usage possibilities and inexpensive cost. Moisture is one of the most important factors affecting wood-based panel performance and the post-treatment conditions affected their affinity to water. When OSB and particleboard are used as substrates for coatings, their surface characteristics play an important role in determining the quality of the final product. Furthermore, roughness can significantly affect the interfacial phenomena such as adsorption, wetting, and adhesion which may have an impact on the coating performance. In this research particleboard and OSB panels were sanded, re-pressed and IR heated and the influence of surface treatments on hardness, roughness, wetting, water, and water vapour absorption was studied. Results showed that sanding improved the wetting of particleboard and OSB with water. Moreover, studied surface treatments increased water absorption and water penetration depth of OSB panels, and re-pressing had a positive effect on reducing the water vapour absorption of particleboard and OSB panels.


2021 ◽  
pp. 003329412110021
Author(s):  
Sizhe Liu ◽  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Xianyou He ◽  
Xiaoxiang Tang ◽  
Shuxian Lai ◽  
...  

There is evidence that greater aesthetic experience can be linked to artworks when their corresponding meanings can be successfully inferred and understood. Modern cultural-expo architecture can be considered a form of artistic creation and design, and the corresponding design philosophy may be derived from representational objects or abstract social meanings. The present study investigates whether cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design is perceived as more beautiful and how architectural photographs and different types of descriptions of architectural appearance designs interact and produce higher aesthetic evaluations. The results showed an obvious aesthetic preference for cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design (Experiment 1). Moreover, we found that the aesthetic rating score of architectural photographs accompanied by an abstract description was significantly higher than that of those accompanied by a representational description only under the difficult-to-understand design condition (Experiment 2). The results indicated that people preferred cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design due to a greater understanding of the design, providing further evidence that abstract descriptions can provide supplementary information and explanation to enhance the sense of beauty of abstract cultural-expo architecture.


Author(s):  
Jonathan Plante ◽  
Karine Latulippe ◽  
Edeltraut Kröger ◽  
Dominique Giroux ◽  
Martine Marcotte ◽  
...  

Abstract Older persons experiencing a longer length of stay (LOS) or delayed discharge (DD) may see a decline in their health and well-being, generating significant costs. This review aimed to identify evidence on the impact of cognitive impairment (CI) on acute care hospital LOS/DD. A scoping review of studies examining the association between CI and LOS/DD was performed. We searched six databases; two reviewers independently screened references until November 2019. A narrative synthesis was used to answer the research question; 58 studies were included of which 33 found a positive association between CI and LOS or DD, 8 studies had mixed results, 3 found an inverse relationship, and 14 showed an indirect link between CI-related syndromes and LOS/DD. Thus, cognitive impairment seemed to be frequently associated with increased LOS/DD. Future research should consider CI together with other risks for LOS/DD and also focus on explaining the association between the two.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 5535
Author(s):  
Marco Benvenuto ◽  
Roxana Loredana Avram ◽  
Alexandru Avram ◽  
Carmine Viola

Background: Our study aims to verify the impact of corporate governance index on financial performance, namely return on assets (ROA), general liquidity, capital adequacy and size of company expressed as total assets in the banking sector for both a developing and a developed country. In addition, we investigate the interactive effect of corporate governance on a homogenous and a heterogeneous banking system. These two banking systems were chosen in order to assess the impact of corporate governance on two distinct types of banking system: a homogenous one such as the Romanian one and a heterogeneous one such as the Italian one. The two systems are very distinct; the Romanian one is represented by only 34 banks, while the Italian one comprises more than 350 banks. Thus, our research question is how a modification in corporate governance legislation is influencing the two different banking systems. The research implication of our study is whether a modification in legislation, thus in the index of corporate governance, is feasible for two different banking sectors and what the best ways to increase the financial performance of banks are without compromising their resilience. Methods: Using survey data from the Italian and Romanian banking systems over the period 2007–2018, we find that the corporate governance has a significant, positive and long-lasting effect on profitability and capital adequacy in both countries. Results: Taking the size of the company into consideration, the impact of the Index of Corporate Governance (ICG) on a homogenous banking system is positive while the impact on a heterogeneous banking system is negative. Conclusions: Our study provides evidence of the impact of IGC on financial performance and sheds light on the importance of the size of the company. Therefore, one can state that the corporate governance principles applied do not encourage the growth of large banks in heterogeneous banking sectors, thereby suggesting new avenues of research associated with new perspectives.


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