Improving the mental health of student-artists: Implementation report of the life skills modules

• Main Author: Ledesma, Maureen Antonette B.
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2021
• Subjects: Students—Mental health; Teenage artists—Mental health; Students—Mental health services; Counseling Psychology; Psychology; Social and Behavioral Sciences
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/faculty_research/13107
• Institution: De La Salle University

This paper aims to respond to the results of the needs assessment conducted. The needs assessment survey results revealed that majority of student-artists are more likely to have mental health problems. Moreover, a number of factors may contribute to the psychological distress and dysfunction of student-artists such as the constant pressure and expectation to perform optimally, the long and late nights of practice, and academic, personal-social and career-specific psychosocial stressors. In particular, student-artists are expected to effectively manage their roles in the creative environment on top of their roles in the academic environment. The life skills modules aim to address the needs of the student-artists in terms of the development of important core life skills –self-awareness, empathy, effective communication, interpersonal relationship, critical thinking, creative thinking, problem- solving, decision-making, coping to stress and coping with emotions – that may improve their mental health thus maintaining a well-balanced student-artist life. The design and development of the life skills modules utilized the life skills framework by the World Health Organization Department of Mental Health (1997) and Hendricks’ 4-H Targeting Life Skills Model (1998). The results of the pilot run evaluation are presented in this paper