9 THE CLINICAL INTERVENTION EFFECT OF MINDFULNESS PAINTING ART THERAPY ON ADOLESCENT DEPRESSION PATIENTS

Abstract Background With the arrival of the new era, teenagers face enormous academic and life pressures, which are accompanied by various psychological and physiological problems, and in severe cases, even depression. Depression can affect various aspects of people’s lives and is gradually becoming younger, with teenagers experiencing more severe depression problems. Therefore, it is necessary to focus on how to improve depression. Related studies have shown that mandala painting, as an art form, can induce mindfulness or flow, and may have a certain effect on intervening in depression. Therefore, the study mainly explored the clinical intervention effect of mandala painting on adolescent depression patients. Methods The study selected 50 adolescent patients diagnosed with depression from a certain middle school, aged between 15-18 years old. The study used a randomized controlled experimental design to randomly divide patients into an experimental group and a control group, with 25 people in each group. The experimental group participated in mindfulness painting art therapy intervention, using mandala painting as part of mindfulness art therapy. The control group did not receive mindfulness painting intervention, but received conventional cognitive-behavioral therapy treatment. The course of treatment for both therapy groups is 8 weeks, twice a week for 1 hour each time. Before and after intervention, scores were obtained using the Self Rating Depression Scale (SDS) and Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAMD) for adolescents. Results The SDS and HAMD scores of patients in the experimental and control groups before and after the 8-week intervention are shown in Table 1. According to Table 1, the SDS and HAMD scores of the experimental group undergoing mindfulness painting art therapy were significantly improved, and the improvement effect was significantly better than that of the control group. Among them, the SDS score of the experimental group was as high as 46.89 ± 4.01 points before intervention, and decreased to 36.91 ± 2.17 points after intervention, with a statistical difference between the two (P<0.05). Meanwhile, there was a statistically significant difference (P<0.05) in the HAMD scores of the experimental group before and after intervention. In addition, in the inter group comparison, the experimental group had significantly lower scores on various scales after intervention compared to the control group. Discussion The research results indicate that mindfulness painting art therapy using mandala painting has a significant clinical intervention effect on adolescent depression patients. Compared to traditional cognitive-behavioral therapy, mandala painting can effectively alleviate depressive symptoms in adolescent depression patients and significantly improve mindfulness levels, with strong clinical application prospects for mental illness. Future research can further explore the mechanism by which mandala painting alleviates depressive symptoms.