Effects of Creative Movement Therapies on Social Communication, Behavioral-Affective, Sensorimotor, Cognitive, and Functional Participation Skills of Individuals With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder affecting multiple developmental domains including social communication, behavioral-affective, sensorimotor, and cognitive systems. There is growing evidence for the use of holistic, whole-body, Creative Movement Therapies (CMT) such as music, dance, yoga, theater, and martial arts in addressing the multisystem impairments in ASD. We conducted a comprehensive quantitative and qualitative review of the evidence to date on the effects of CMT on multiple systems in individuals with ASD. The strongest evidence, both in terms of quantity and quality, exists for music and martial arts-based interventions followed by yoga and theater, with very limited research on dance-based approaches. Our review of 72 studies (N = 1,939 participants) across participants with ASD ranging from 3 to 65 years of age suggests that at present there is consistent evidence from high quality studies for small-to-large sized improvements in social communication skills following music and martial arts therapies and medium-to-large improvements in motor and cognitive skills following yoga and martial arts training, with insufficient evidence to date for gains in affective, sensory, and functional participation domains following CMT. Although promising, our review serves as a call for more rigorous high-quality research to assess the multisystem effects of CMT in ASD. Based on the existing literature, we discuss implications of our findings for autism researchers and also provide evidence-based guidelines for clinicians to incorporate CMT approaches in their plan of care for individuals with ASD.

Creativity of L.N. Andreev in the reception of D.V. Filosofov (based on the material of literary and critical articles 1907)

The author examines the peculiarities of the reception of L.N. Andreev, reflected in the literary-critical articles of D.V. Filosofov, written in 1907. The features of his critical method are characterized. It is shown that the interpretation of Andreev’s works in these works of Filosofov was subordinated to the concept of building a “new religious consciousness”, developed by him together with his spiritual allies — D.S. Merezhkovsky and Z.N. Gippius. In 1907, the creative personality of Andreev was still characterized by Filosofov as a “background” figure, in comparison with the personality of Gorky and the cohort of realists united around the publishing house called “Knowledge”. The critic saw the damage to Andreev’s world outlook in the writer’s rejection of “culture”, “consciousness” and “religious community”. At the same time, he strenuously tried to “cut off” Andreev from the “philosophy” of Gorky and the realists of the Gorky circle. In addition, Andreev’s ideological and artistic quest was investigated by Filosofov in the context of such a complex literary phenomenon at the turn of the century as “mystical anarchism”. In general, the critical assessments of Andreev’s work presented in the articles of Filosofov in 1907 are ambiguous and dialectical. Revealing the “strength” and “weakness” of Andreev the artist, Filosofov in many ways showed himself as a critic and “educator”. He not only waged a struggle with Andreev, the singer of pessimism, despair and “nothingness”, but also tried to direct this talented writer along the “correct” ideological path, turn the vector of his creative movement towards “religious revival”, that is, “new Christianity”.

Emotion Expression when Teaching with Creative Movement

The study focuses on students emotion expression during geometry teaching including creative movement (experimental group or EG) and without it (control group or CG). The sample (N = 104) was made up of primary school (second-grade) students: 66 were assigned to the EG and 38 to the CG. Of these, 12 students from the EG and 8 from the CG were randomly selected for observation of emotion: type, intensity, triggering situation, and response of others. For the observed students, the intensity of emotion expression was also measured by the facial expression recognition software FaceReader. All of the students self-assessed their contentedness with the teaching. The students in the EG and the CG expressed various emotions, with joy being the most prevalent, followed by anger. The most frequent situations triggering joy were activities in the EG and the CG. The intensity of joy was higher in the EG than in the CG when assessed by observation, but there was no significant difference when assessed by FaceReader. The intensity of anger expression was at a similar level in both groups. Both students and teachers responded to students joy expression, but only the students responded to anger expression in the EG and the CG. The students in both groups expressed a high level of contentedness with the teaching. Key words: creative movement; emotion expression; intensity of emotions; students; teaching method.