Improving Social Skills through Collaborative Artwork and Group Activity

Abstract

In this chapter, we introduce the framework and practice of collaborative artwork and group activity. In particular, we focus on the collaborative block creation method and show its psychological evidence. The first section introduces the theoretical background underlying collaborative work and overviews recent studies concerning social skills, especially from psychological perspective. The second section introduces this study, in which we demonstrated the effectiveness of collaborative LEGO® block creation work as a medium of communication in group therapy and investigated the effects of fostering communication, especially for developing social skills and trust. The third section focuses on interpersonal relations. We examined the psychological effect of collaborative block creation from the perspective of Ibasho, a Japanese term for one's whereabouts or a place of our own. Next, we show a case study of collaborative LEGO block creation for Japanese adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Finally, we introduce a new type of group approach in the area of student counseling.