Tan Yun Yie, Elaine

This qualitative, practitioner-based thesis explored how art media in art therapy can aid co-regulation with a child from a single-parent family in Singapore experiencing socio-emotional challenges.

Children faced with adverse childhood experiences may develop a deep sense of insecurity and mistrust in others, low self-esteem, negative self-concept and a dysregulated nervous system that undermines their capacity to feel safe. As such, rebuilding trust and safety is a foundational step in intervention for attachment, relational and developmental repair.

Yet, due to the pathology associated with their early experiences, children require the support of another individual to manage emotional arousals to feel safe before learning to self-regulate. Co-regulation was thus identified as a therapeutic tool to achieve eventual emotional regulation for the child. Framed through attachment theory, object relations theory, Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics and the Expressive Therapies Continuum, this thesis investigated how art media supported co-regulatory activities in art therapy through repetitive, consistent attuned interactions, holding and containment.

Findings suggest that the presence of art media as a third dimension within the triangular relationship can assist the therapist in facilitating co-regulation by utilising the media’s inherent properties and task structures, kinaesthetic and sensory components, and containing and symbolic qualities, to support a bottom-up somatosensory-motor and aesthetic relational attunement through therapist mirroring and co-creation.

The effectiveness of the art media employed to aid co-regulation is also dependent on the therapist’s familiarity with the media and whether it is attuned to the child’s needs, preferences, developmental stage, and cultural background, which are factors that should be continuously reviewed as they may evolve over time.