Writing about traumatic or stressful experiences has been shown to have physical
and mental health benefits. This book describes two studies that were
designed to test the hypothesis that programmed writing would enhance the
mood, health, and dance skill of students enrolled in dance education classes.
Study 1 included 40 participants with a mean age of 17.1 years who were enrolled
in a community-based summer dance camp. Study 2 included 100 participants
with a mean age of 20.5 years who were enrolled in university-based
dance education classes. Both studies utilized a pre/post design, and participants
were randomly assigned to a programmed writing group or a control
writing group. The programmed writing group was instructed to write
about their thoughts and feelings about dance, and the control writing group
was instructed to write about what they learned in class that day. Participants
also completed questionnaires about their mood, health, and perceived
dance skill, and were rated by independent observers on dance skill and attitude.
A series of multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVA) examined the
effects of programmed writing on mood, health and dance skill. The results
of Study 1 suggested that programmed writing had a positive effect on
mood, but failed to have a significant effect on health or dance skill. The results
for Study 2 suggested that programmed writing did not have a significant
effect on health, mood, or dance skill. These studies appear to be an appropriate
application of programmed writing in an applied setting, and call
into question the ability of programmed writing to effectively cause positive
changes in health, mood, and goal attainment, as is typically reported in the
literature. Ideas for future research such as linguistic analysis of participants'
journals and further clarification of the role of stress and emotionality in
dance are discussed.