Comparison the Effectiveness of “Drama Therapy” and Resilience Training on Anxiety and Aggression of Children with Depression

Depressed children are in a worse health and well-being situation than non-depressed children, and there are many ways to reduce their psychological problems, including drama therapy and resilience training. The aim of this study was to compare the effectiveness of drama therapy and resilience training on anxiety and aggression in children with depression.

This was a quasi-experimental study with pre-test and post-test design with control group. The study population was male students with depression who referred to educational counseling centers in the fifth and sixth districts of Tehran in the academic year 2009-2010. The research sample was 60 people who were selected by convenience sampling method and randomly replaced in three groups (20 people in each group). The intervention groups were trained in 9 sessions of 60 minutes (two sessions per week) with drama therapy and resilience training, respectively, and the control group was placed on a waiting list for training. Research instruments included; demographic questionnaire, “Childrenchr('39')s Depression Inventory”, “Spence Childrenchr('39')s Anxiety Scale”, and “Aggression Questionnaire”. The collected data were analyzed in SPSS. 21.

Drama therapy and resilience training methods reduced anxiety in children with depression compared to the control group (P <0.05), but there was no significant difference between the two methods in reducing their anxiety (P> 0.05). Also, drama therapy reduced aggression in children with depression compared to resilience training and control group (P <0.05), but there was no significant difference between resilience training and control group in aggression variable (P> 0.05).

Drama therapy reduced both anxiety and aggression in children with depression, but resilience training only reduced their anxiety. Therefore, planning for the use of drama therapy by child psychologists and therapists to improve the mental health of children with depression is suggested.