Handbook of Arts and Health

Arts research and practice offer innovation and new solutions for psychiatric and mental health sectors, given conventional methods do not consistently serve the most marginalised groups, those living at the intersections of precarity, and those who find verbal and cognitive tasks too demanding. By drawing on the wider literature and our experience of delivering an arts and health research programme to improve support for young people who had adverse experiences in childhood, we discovered dynamic principles and conceptual and skills competencies that we hope add to the emerging guidance on interdisciplinary research. Vulnerable participants needed support to retain agency and showcase their abilities and strengths, rather than be exposed to potentially extractive and demanding approaches, however well-intentioned these may be. However, this means we needed to attend to struggles to participate and connect, through interdisciplinary skills and competencies; for example, active listening, self-awareness, slow thinking, being vigilant and identifying disconnects, and not assume talking and sharing perspectives is sufficient, without deeper dialogue around contested categories and concepts and ways of working. We moved beyond a multidisciplinary approach, into an interdisciplinary dialogue, which enabled us to create a third transdisciplinary space in some areas of our work.