Developing Emotion Abilities through Engagement with the Arts

The arts have long been tied to various emotional processes, both as a way for artists to express their emotions, and for audiences to understand the emotions of themselves and others. Therefore, engaging in the arts across childhood and adulthood is often hypothesized as a way to foster emotion abilities. While there is burgeoning evidence of various emotional skills such as emotional intelligence, emotional control, and empathy being fostered through artistic engagement, many questions remain. These include questions about the exact skills and behaviors within emotional processing and functioning that are affected; whether each art form (i.e. dance, music, theatre, visual arts, cinema, etc.) differentially affects emotion abilities; whether there are critical periods for engagement throughout the developmental trajectory of childhood and the lifespan; and the possible psychological, neurological, and environmental mechanisms for these changes. This chapter presents recent empirical evidence for what we know about engaging with the arts as a producer and consumer, particularly focused in middle childhood, and the development of various emotion abilities. As a whole, the literature points to inconsistent findings and large gaps in knowledge; future directions are proposed.