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Music therapy benefits youths with emotional, behavioural problems

Wednesday 29th October 2014

New research from Queen's University Belfast has found that the social skills and self esteem of young people suffering emotional, behavioural and developmental problems was significantly improved when they received music therapy.

Music therapy is a practical intervention which involves children writing songs or composing music to express their feelings. The music therapist may ask the child to play a tune to describe their week or how they feel. For children with a mental health problem this may be easier than expressing their feelings using words.

Researchers monitored 251 young people aged between eight and 16 over a three year period. All of the young people were being treated for emotional, developmental or behavioural problems. Participants were divided into two groups with 128 being given the usual care options, while 123 were assigned additional music therapy.

The study found that those who received music therapy had improved communicative and interactive skills, compared to those who only received usual care options. Early findings suggest that these benefits were sustained over the long term.

Dr Valerie Holmes from the Centre for Public Health, School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences and co-researcher, said: "This is the largest study ever to be carried out looking at music therapy's ability to help this very vulnerable group. What we found was that while music therapy improves communication and interaction skills for all children there is significant evidence that it benefits those aged 13 and older.

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