This study was to examine the effect of collage group art therapy program on
ego-resilience of young immigrants and to improve their ego-resilience. The
therapy is to help them integrate into Korean society and lead harmonious and
balanced lives. The subjects of this study were 7 young immigrants aged from
14 to 19, who were attending Didimdol School run by Multi-cultural Family
Center of P University in Gyeonggi-do. The collage group art program provided
10 sessions for 2 weeks with each session lasting 90 minutes. To examine the
effect of the program, qualitative analysis was performed by giving the pre and
post-therapy ego-resilience test. Wilcoxon signed rank test, a nonparametric test,
was conducted with statistical analysis by using SPSS/WIN 20.0 program to
validate the changes of mean value and standard deviation of test scores. The
results of this study were as follows: First, collage group art therapy program
had a positive effect on ego-resilience of the subjects. Second, collage group art
therapy program had a positive impact on self-efficacy, problem-resolving ability,
empathy, acceptance, and optimism. It can be seen in individual internal factors,
sub-factors associated with ego-resilience of the subjects. This result may
indicate that collage group art therapy improved the young immigrants
adaptation to reality, and was effective in improving their ego-resilience.
Therefore, collage group art therapy program was found to be an effective
approach to initial adaptation of young immigrants to Korean society and opened
new opportunity for psychological healing.