Integrating the Expressive Arts into Counseling Practice: Theory-Based Interventions

Once in a while a book comes along that is both unique and invaluable.... By reading and studying this work, practitioners can enrich the lives of their clients and their own effectiveness. [It] translates theory into practice and transforms mainstream counseling approaches into extremely useful devices for modifying the way clients and counselors function in therapy.

While traditional "talk" therapies remain at the foundation of counseling, the use of expressive and creative arts in conjunction with these methods can often deepen the healing process as well as expedite diagnosis, treatment and prevention. Integrating the Expressive Arts into Counseling Practice is designed to provide readers with an understanding of the ways in which expressive arts counseling techniques can be productively integrated into the leading counseling modalities.

Accessible to students and practitioners alike, it presents field-tested expressive arts interventions within the context of the most commonly taught theoretical orientations, including Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, Solution-Focused Brief Therapy, Gestalt Theory, Adlerian Theory, Choice Theory, Existential Theory, Feminist Theory, Person-Centered Theory, Narrative Therapy, and Integrative Theory. These chapters include the work of over 40 contributors, including expert practitioners and faculty, who offer detailed descriptions of their own successful expressive arts interventions.

• Presents over 50 expressive art interventions in an easy, step-by-step format
• Describes interventions within a framework of 10 commonly used treatment modalities
• Explains the connection between theory and intervention
• Includes art, writing, drama, music, movement, dance, puppetry, and sandplay activities.
• Discusses appropriate populations, settings, and diagnoses with which to use each intervention

Suzanne Degges-White, PhD, LPC, LMHC, NCC, is a licensed counselor and professor and chair of the Department of Counseling, Adult and Higher Education at Northern Illinois University.

Nancy L. Davis, PhD, LMHC, LSC, is Associate Professor and Program Director, School Counseling, Purdue University . She has served in education for 46 years as teacher, professional school counselor, and professor.