Promoting positive caregiving experience using Art Therapy

Being a caregiver to a person with any kind of morbidity can lead to several negative experiences or caregiver burden. Significant research has gone into studying the negative effects of caregiving or caregiver burden, with fewer studies on the positive effects of caregiving, some of which have reported overall better health outcomes for caregivers who report more positive effects of caregiving. Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder often detected early in childhood and parents of children with ASD face many challenges including experiencing caregiver burden. Art therapy interventions have been shown to reduce feelings of anxiety and depression as well as improve the overall well-being in different populations. This paper briefly discusses various aspects of caregiving such as positive and negative caregiver experiences, and uses them to develop an art therapy based curriculum to promote positive caregiver experiences in parents who are caregivers of children with ASD. It is expected that such an intervention may reduce some of the caregiver burden experienced by the caregiver as well as promote better health outcomes for the caregivers.