Research Symposium

BIO

I am a sophomore at Florida State University majoring in Biological Sciences. After graduating with my bachelor’s I plan to go to medical school and pursue a career in general pediatrics, and possibly own my own practice one day.

The Slow Regard of Silent Things: Building Mental & Emotional Resilience in Dancers

Abstract

This study evaluated an educational intervention targeted at building mental and emotional resilience in dancers and documents the prevalence of mental health stress in a university dance environment.  Five BFA dance majors completed the intervention: six modules in an application developed by a clinician who works with dancers and one-hour weekly meetings. This study observed the influence of mental resilience training on behaviors relevant to dance performance. The training was evaluated using a multiple-baseline-across-dancers experimental design with secondary measures of the RAND Mental Health Inventory, a Mental Health Knowledge Base Questionnaire, and Social Validity ratings. Results show targeted behaviors improved for every dancer who completed training with a mean improvement of 50%. Scores on the RAND and Knowledge Base questionnaires improved by averages of six and thirteen points respectively. Results support previous research, corroborating that dancers are facing mental stress. Findings also suggest that completing six application-based, individually coached, weekly mental resilience training sessions improved the quality of pre-professional dancers' interactions with their training environments and self-reported mental health levels. This study was run as a systematic replication of the study done in the 2021-2022 school year with similar results expected. 

Keywords: Mental Health, Dancers, Emotional Resilience