Undergraduate Music Therapy Students’ Experiences as Clients in Short-Term Group Music Therapy

Purpose of the Study and BackgroundThe overarching purpose of the present study was to contribute to the knowledge base about the use of personal therapy in music therapy training, a particular interest of ours. More specifically, we aimed to learn about the experiences of our own undergraduate students in short-term group music therapy. Students' experiences of self, others, and the therapeutic process were the three primary foci. Specific subquestions of the research were as follows:As a result of their participation in short-term group music therapy,1. What do students learn about themselves? (i.e., what personal insights are gained?)2. What do students learn about other student participants? (i.e., what insights about others are gained?)3. What do students learn about therapeutic processes? (i.e., what do they learn about group process, facilitation of music therapy, etc.?)4. What do students find most meaningful about their involvement as a client?Since the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) does not mandate personal therapy for undergraduate or graduate students, the inclusion of therapy in music therapy training programs is a decision that each program coordinator makes. Data from a recent survey study (Gardstrom & Jackson, 201 1) indicate that a very small percentage of undergraduate program coordinators actually require students to engage in personal therapy. However, nearly half (46.3%) of those surveyed indicated that they encourage students to seek therapy. Some of these individuals promote therapy only when students have an obvious crisis or psychopathology that interferes with their academic and clinical success (a stance that aligns with arguments for mandated therapy for students in counselor training), whereas others believe that therapy is useful for all students toward building professional skills, increasing understanding of the therapy process, and developing empathy for clients.Narrative data from this same survey suggested that there is a fair amount of confusion among coordinators between personal music therapy and experiential learning tactics, such as role playing, peer support groups, and supervision involving experiential methods (Gardstrom & Jackson, 2011; further information about such distinctions can be found in this survey study and in Murphy, 2007). For purposes of the present report, we thus thought it critical to define as clearly as possible our conceptualization of personal music therapy in student training as distinct from experiential instruction. Our definition is as follows: Personal music therapy in undergraduate training is a music-assisted process in which students participate genuinely as clients in private (unobserved) individual or group sessions that are facilitated consistently by a credentialed therapist and that aim at cognitive, emotional, intuitional, and/or behavioral exploration and change.Personal therapy has historically been recommended for psychotherapists in training, and the number of programs that include requisite personal psychotherapy is increasing (Forrest, Elman, Gizara, & Vache-Haase, 1999). According to psychotherapy literature, personal therapy for individuals in training may increase professional efficacy through enhanced sensitivity and empathy for the client, increased self-awareness, and allowances for appropriate handling of countertransference (Macaskill, 1999), and may increase the trainee's optimum psychological health through increased self-awareness, improved emotional and mental functioning, and elevated self-esteem (Gold & Hilsenroth, 2009; Macaskill & Macaskill, 1992; Norcross, et al., 1988; Pope & Tabachnik, 1994). Despite ongoing research in this area, however, requisite psychotherapy in training remains a controversial topic (Daw & Joseph, 2007), and neither its risks nor its benefits have been confirmed.Numerous authors have speculated about the benefits of personal music therapy and advocated for its inclusion in undergraduate and graduate training (Bonde, 2007; Bradt, 1 997; Bruscia, 1 998b; Chong, 2007; Goldberg, 1 989; Hesser, 1985; Loewy, 2003; McGuire, 2006; Munro, 1985; Pedersen, 2002; Prefontaine, 2006; Tims, 1989), but none of these individuals appears to have systematically studied their speculations and reported on findings, with the exception of Scheiby (1998). …