Quick Links: Troubled Teens
The term expressive therapy describes therapy techniques designed to help troubled teens by encouraging the use of their imagination and creativity. The approach taken with expressive therapies are quite different from traditional cognitive or psychotherapy methods, and for some teens they are extremely effective.
Therapy that encourages creative expression are particularly helpful to teens who are difficult to reach emotionally, struggle to express themselves verbally or aren’t making progress in other therapy settings. In some situations the pain a teen is experiencing is just too difficult to communicate using words.
Expressive therapy encourages teens to understand and convey what they are thinking or feeling in ways that other forms of therapy simply don’t tap into. There are several different types of expressive therapies to include:
Most residential programs for teens incorporate expressive therapies into their comprehensive treatment. There are also specially trained expressive arts therapists in most communities who offer this type of therapy on an outpatient basis.
Quick Links: Troubled Teens