My Future: Psychodrama and Meditation to Improve Well-Being Through the Elaboration of Traumatic Loss Among Italian High School Students.
Frontiers in psychology January 1, 2020 Ines Testoni, Lucia Ronconi, Gianmarco Biancalani et al. 18 citations
A death education program using psychodramatic techniques and Tibetan bell meditation helped Italian high school students process traumatic grief after two classmates died in a car accident and a suicide. The intervention aimed to prevent the Werther effect—imitative suicide. Among 82 students who completed pre- and post-test surveys (45 in the experimental group, 37 in the control group), the experimental group showed reduced fear of death and avoidance, and normalized death as a natural part of life, improving well-being. The findings suggest well-being arises not from the absence of suffering but from the capacity to think creatively about trauma.