Abstract
Examined the outcome of a 16-week play group therapy intervention for six highly stressed preschool-aged children compared to a preschool-aged control group. The focus of the group was to help the children build social skills, learn to express emotions appropriately, increase understanding of stress events, and learn new coping skills. The results indicated a significant increase in anxious and externalizing behaviors during the course of the intervention for the treatment group subjects compared to controls. Furthermore, group treatment subjects also indicated a significant increase in social skills during the group intervention. However, there were no significant differences on the psycho-social measure from pre-test to post-test. Despite the lack of differences on quantitative measures of children's functioning, parent report on a qualitative measure indicated improvement in children's psycho-social functioning at the end of treatment. Implications of the play therapy group approach for children exposed to major stressors are discussed.
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Jackson, Y., Rump, B.S., Ferguson, K. et al. Group Play Therapy for Young Children Exposed to Major Stressors: Comparison of Quantitative and Qualitative Evaluation Methods. Journal of Child and Adolescent Group Therapy 9, 3–16 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022996520727
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022996520727