Tiltai

Animal-assisted therapy involves the use of various animals; however, dogs are the most commonly used, while cat-assisted therapy (felinotherapy) remains a relatively new and under-explored field. Felinotherapy is considered a complementary method that supports conventional treatment approaches, and may have a positive impact on children’s mental health by enhancing emotional well-being, social skills and the child-animal bond, particularly in work with autistic children. Nevertheless, there is still a lack of scientific evidence supporting the effectiveness of this therapy. The aim of this article is to present the first results of pilot felinotherapy sessions conducted in Lithuania. The study involved 12 children of different ages with various emotional and behavioural difficulties. Data were collected through the analysis of parental feedback after the therapy, using a questionnaire consisting of open-ended and closed questions about the child’s condition before, during and after the therapy, as well as observed changes and overall evaluation of the therapy. In summary, based on parental feedback following cat-assisted therapy, this intervention has a positive impact on children experiencing various behavioural and emotional difficulties. Parents noted that after the therapy, their children experienced reduced anxiety, anger and tension, and began to interact more. According to the parents’ responses, this therapy fosters self-control skills and reduces social isolation. Cat-assisted therapy stands out as a gentle, child-friendly approach that helps children relax and engage more easily in the therapeutic process. However, due to the limited sample size, these results cannot be broadly generalised. Felinotherapy is a promising but under-researched area of animal-assisted therapy. Further systematic and comprehensive scientific research is necessary to substantiate its effectiveness.

The practical use of drawing in the work of psychologists, both in foreign countries and in Lithuania, far outstrips the number of publications about it. The development and peculiarities of the drawing of typically developing (TD) children, i.e. children without developmental disorders, whose aim is to represent an object in a way that makes it recognisable, have long been of interest to researchers. However, there has been less research on expressive drawing, which aims to express emotion or mood. Even fewer have scientifically studied the drawings of children with disorders, and this study aimed to assess intergroup differences between expressive and representational drawings of typically and atypically developing younger school-age children. The study involved 53 children, including 24 typically developing children (TD), 12 children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and 17 children with hearing impairment (HI). Their average age was 8.5 years. The children drew two expressive drawings (happy and sad), and two representational drawings (a house and a person running). The evaluation of the drawings focused on: 1) the quality of the match between mood and task; 2) the representativeness of the house and the running man drawings, and 3) the correlation between the representativeness and the expressiveness of the drawings. The results showed that the expressiveness of happy drawings did not differ significantly between the groups, while the expressiveness of sad drawings was significantly higher in the TD group. The most representative were the drawings of children in the TD group. In all groups, as representativeness increased, so did the level of expressiveness. A statistically significant relationship between representativeness and expressiveness was found only in the ASD group.