Dramatherapy - Volume 40, Issue 1, 2019

This essay will outline some of the means and implications of attending to living processes in Sesame Dramatherapy. Broadly defined, living processes are those which exceed rigid, reductive, fixed or thing-like concepts. Insofar as our more mobile concepts often collapse into fixed definitions or signs, we might say that living processes resist conceptualisation altogether. I will consider how to avoid objectifying living processes which, as a category, encompass psychic processes and our experiences of other people and living beings. I will investigate how it is possible to enter into an ‘I-Thou’ relationship with the diverse phenomena of Sesame Dramatherapy sessions, stepping out of ‘I-it’, objectifying ways of relating. In order to do this, I will draw upon three main philosophical streams: Goethean observation, phenomenology and Eugene Gendlin’s Philosophy of the Implicit. Some of the therapeutic implications of this will then be outlined, with particular reference to the creation of meaning and the experience of selfhood.

The Internet has become thoroughly embedded into most aspects of modern life, and no one is more plugged-in than the youngest generations. With the aim of utilising the omnipresence of the digital space to therapeutic ends, this article examines the application of online storymaking interventions with adolescents. The young people discussed are quite isolated and high-need; they have self-excluded from mainstream school and are now pursuing education in an alternative online provision, where they also have access to therapy. Following an overview of the current literature on web-based therapies, this article offers two illustrative case studies in which a story-based dramatherapy intervention was delivered online. This will include an evaluation of the therapeutic work from the case studies using the BASIC Ph assessment method, as well as a broader discussion on the experience of working as a therapist online.

This study adds to a small literature on social skills measures and interventions for adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or related social communication difficulties (SCD) without intellectual disability (ID). In study 1, a new multimodal assessment tool, the role-play assessment of social skills (R-PASS), was used to measure real-time application of social skills. The scores of adults with ASD/SCD were marginally lower than those of neurotypical adults, with a large effect size, suggesting that the measure can identify differences between the two groups. Therefore, the R-PASS shows potential as an objective tool to assess dynamic and naturalistic social skills. In Study 2, a pre–post single-group design study, we measured the effectiveness of a drama-based social skills intervention for seven participants who self-identified as having ASD/SCD. The R-PASS was used by external raters blind to diagnosis and intervention status to compare the performance of intervention participants to that of neurotypical adults. R-PASS scores suggested substantial improvement of social skills in the majority of participants post-intervention. Furthermore, relatives’ and participants’ perception of their social communication and self-regulation skills improved from pre- to post-intervention. These results suggest that the intervention may have helped the participants improve their social skills.