Art Therapy is a new solution to the upsurge in the amount of COVID-19 related anxiety patients, allowing patients to learn self-compassion and emotional control through  artistic expressions. 

According to the CDC, the COVID-19 pandemic has created an upsurge in mental illness globally. 

Although people are not yet taking these rising patterns in mental health issues seriously enough, they echo an urgent need to discover new complementary interventions to help improve distressed moods and alleviate mental health risks. 

Until now, there have been no specific treatment of covid anxiety or other mental health issues except the use of expensive medications or constant visits with therapists, which makes the problem a much more demanding issue to decipher. 

During quarantine, people needed an easily accessible, low-cost therapeutic activity that promotes self-care and healthy outlets for heightened emotions.

Thus, art therapy was seen as a possible tool for individuals to break themselves out of their anxiety problems during isolations. 

To explain the current context in detail, the COVID-19 Mental Disorders Collaborators showed that the pandemic had led to a 27.6% increase in the cases of major depressive disorders and 25.6% increase in cases of anxiety disorders globally during 2020. 

Another survey that was recently done by the CDC have shown that the cases of these so-called “covid anxieties” have increased considerably in the United states during the pandemic; 40.9% of the surveyees reported that they have had at least one behavioral health condition during quarantine. 

The survey also stated that one of the biggest causes for these “covid anxieties” was due to the feeling of isolation from others, which further resulted in significant loneliness and feelings of alienation. 

The solution is art therapy, an experience-oriented therapy that uses the visual arts (e.g., painting, drawing, sculpting, clay modeling) to provide therapy or as part of multidisciplinary treatment programs for anxiety and other psychological conditions.

Assessing the effectiveness of these interventions have been challenging due to a lack of scientific data, but a qualitative study of 102 art and mental health projects concluded that art participation enhanced levels of empowerment and was associated with improvements in participants’ mental health. 

Overall, because art therapy offers a multiplicity of benefits, including the ability to reduce feelings of isolation and alienation, it can be an excellent solution for COVID-19 anxiety. 

It honors the inherent need of individuals to have autonomy in their expressions, creates an outlet of such expressions for individuals in times of high stress, and provides deep introspection for the participant. 

To explain in detail, creative arts therapies can be helpful in contributing to emotional control by providings patients with the ability to create and express their thoughts in their arts. 

It is through these outlets that the feelings of isolation lessen. Through expressing oneself, individuals are able to perform self-compassion and mindfulness, as well as providing an outlet for their emotions. 

The act of making art itself is tied to the ability to go into a mindful framework in the practice of self-care and self-compassion. 

Self-compassion is correlated with reduced anxiety and greater life satisfaction, psychological well-being, and social connection. 

Art therapy can connect fear to a positive sensory experience, providing the individual with stronger coping skills and increased control over their emotions, which will eventually help their covid anxieties and other mental health problems. 

However, further studies are needed to strengthen the evidence for the art therapy’s efficacy so that this type of self-based treatment can spread to a wider population. 

To conclude, art therapy should be referred to as an actual treatment that doctors can recommend to their own patients. But this can only happen if art therapy’s contribution to value-based healthcare can be concretely ascertained. 

Rachel Lee

Grade 9

Chadwick International