Date of Graduation

5-2014

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Counselor Education (PhD)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

Rehabilitation, Human Resources and Communication Disorders

Advisor/Mentor

Kristin Higgins

Committee Member

Roy Farley

Second Committee Member

Ketevan Mamiseishvili

Third Committee Member

Michael Loos

Keywords

Activity Group, Counseling, Expressive Arts, Group Counseling, Knitting, Therapy

Abstract

The primary purpose of the current study was to explore the use of knitting as an expressive arts technique. Knitting groups were conducted with 4th grade elementary school students. Each group met for 8 sessions on a weekly basis. Participants were randomly assigned to either the experimental group or control group. The experimental group received knitting instructions in the group format first. Prior to beginning the group, all participants, their teachers, and their parents completed the Social Skills Improvement System assessment (Gresham & Elliot, 2008). This measure was repeated following the end of the experimental group and again approximately 8 weeks later, after the control group received the intervention. Results were analyzed using the Mann-Whitney-Wilcoxon test, due to the small sample size (n = 10) in this study. The results indicated significant effects for Social Skills and Engagement as measured by the Student form. Many variables had medium and large effect sizes, which may indicate information helpful for clinical applications.

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