Beyond Practice: A Postmodern Feminist Perspective on Art Therapy Research

The profession of art therapy has failed to integrate gender issues and feminism into the art therapy literature and research. One of the ways gender has had an impact on the profession is through beliefs about research. There has always been a pervasive assumption among art therapists that we need to do more quantitative research in order to further the aims of the profession. This article discusses the relationship between this assumption and the lack of attention to gender. With the hope of generating a dialogue about gender issues in art therapy and art therapy research, this article examines whether there are research methodologies that are less gender biased than others and whether there are research methods which are particularly suited to art therapy.