Building self-esteem and identity in teens and young adults through creative expression and intention setting
Alice Lee and Sauda Musharrat
When I started to explore the topic of identity and finding a sense of belonging in an unfamiliar environment I was struggling to define what my problem statement was. Alice’s original topic on “Body Image and Self-Esteem in Adolescents” also revolved within the themes that I kept finding in my initial research. So once we started working together, we realized we could frame these issues within the same context of defining identity and self esteem issues that affected both of us, and which we could relate to. Our hypothesis is currently exploring a possible solution – art therapy and intention setting – to the struggles that is common among the youth in New York city, aptly positioned as the best sampling ground due to its diverse nature and immigration history.
Secondary research to direct our next steps:
We used the basis of these publications to do brief landscape analysis on the issues that affect youth. Both of us had some idea to look for certain factors that we hypothesized was relevant to this topic. For example [1] focuses on developing habits within art practices which can be used as therapy that remains constant among adolescents as they are constantly experiencing shifts in their external environment. We also wanted to find other research that looked into factors, such as cultural identity and migration [3], culture conflict, body image and mental health [4], and social media [5] which could also guide our interview questions.
Stakeholder Map:
Primary research:
Reflections:
Our second interview method employed a self-reporting strategy that was more about exploring the ways in which our interviewees would express themselves beyond traditional communication means. We encouraged them to answer a few prompts using emojis which gave us some interesting insights that define how they see themselves. It was almost as if we could read their emotions through the answers. One observation was that 3/4 used the slightly upset emoji to define how they felt about themselves which could possibly indicate some mental health struggle or dissatisfaction with their current life. The other overall observation was how much age affected the factors of happiness throughout our interviewee group.