Marcus, thirty-eight, told his counselor in the first week that he didn’t “do art.” He was a contractor. He measured things, built things, fixed things. Sitting in a circle with a box of colored pencils sounded like a punishment. But the schedule on the wall said Thursday afternoon was art, and Friday had a music session, and he’d run out of reasons to skip.
By week three he was the one who asked if the drum circle could run long. He still wouldn’t call it art. He did say it was the first hour all week when he wasn’t thinking about the next hour.
If you’re wondering whether creative therapies are a soft extra in addiction treatment or something with real evidence behind them, the answer sits somewhere in the middle. It’s worth knowing exactly where.
Why Treatment Programs Include Creative Work
Most people picture addiction treatment as talking: individual sessions, group sessions, family sessions. Talking matters. But plenty of people arrive in treatment worn out on words, or unsure what they feel, or wary of saying it out loud to strangers. Music, painting, movement and cooking offer a different way in. They give hands and attention something to do, and they let a conversation start sideways instead of head-on.
That is a reasonable idea. The next question is whether it works, and what “works” means.
What the Evidence Shows for Music
The strongest evidence concerns music therapy. A 2022 Cochrane review, one of the most rigorous kinds of research summary, looked at music therapy for people with substance use disorders. It pulled together 21 studies with 1,984 participants, all in detoxification or longer-term treatment settings.
Its main findings:
- Motivation: Music therapy added to standard care likely improved motivation for treatment more than standard care alone
- Craving: It likely reduced craving compared with standard care alone, and the review found that therapy lasting longer than a single session was associated with bigger reductions
- Staying in treatment: There was no meaningful effect on retention
- Mood: There was no clear evidence of effects on depression or anxiety
The review’s authors describe the benefit as music therapy used as an add-on to other treatment, not as a replacement for it.
The Honest Caveats
Cochrane reviews tend to be careful, and this one is. The authors rated their confidence in the findings as low to moderate. Most of the included studies were run by the same researcher in the same detoxification unit, which may limit how far the results apply elsewhere. The review also reported no data on adverse events.
It covers music therapy specifically. It doesn’t tell us the same thing about painting or drawing, and it would be wrong to assume it does. Art therapy has its own, smaller research literature, and the findings are less settled.
So the fair summary is this. Creative therapies are not magic, and they are not a substitute for the core work of treatment. But there is reasonable evidence that, alongside standard care, music can help with two things people in early recovery struggle with: craving and motivation. That is not a small thing.
A Familiar Scenario: What Marcus Noticed
Marcus never suddenly fell in love with art. What changed was smaller. Craft sessions gave him a structured hour that wasn’t about willpower. He noticed he was calmer after sessions, then noticed he looked forward to them, then noticed he’d been looking forward to something at all, which he hadn’t in a long time.
He also found that the people he’d been wary of in group were easier to talk to over a half-finished drawing than across a circle of chairs. Creative work gave everyone something to look at besides each other.
What to Look for in a Program
If you’re researching treatment for yourself or someone you love, you can ask about creative therapies without treating them as the deciding factor. Useful questions include:
- Are creative therapies led by trained staff, or are they an activity filler?
- How often do sessions happen, and are they optional?
- How do they fit around individual therapy, family work and medical care?
- What does a typical day look like?
- Does the program also include movement, daily structure and time outdoors?
Sessions that happen once are not the same as an ongoing part of a week, and the music evidence suggests that repetition matters.
One Example of How Programs Put It Together
Sunflower Recovery Center in Osawatomie, Kansas, near Kansas City, runs a residential treatment program that is 60 days long and co-ed. Alongside individual, group and family therapy, its daily schedule includes yoga, gym sessions, art therapy, music therapy and cooking classes. It also treats substance use together with mental health conditions or trauma. As with any program, it’s worth visiting or calling with your own questions, because fit matters more than any list of features.
If You Need Help Now
If you or someone you know is in crisis or thinking about self-harm, call or text 988 in the US, or call emergency services right away. If you’re unsure where to begin, a family doctor can help you find options.
Back to Thursday Afternoon
Marcus finished his program and went back to work. He doesn’t draw. But there’s a small hand drum on a shelf in his garage, and on rough days he takes it down. He says it doesn’t solve anything. It just gives the evening somewhere to start.
Sources
- Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2022, Issue 5. Music therapy for people with substance use disorders (CD012576). Published 9 May 2022. https://www.cochrane.org/CD012576/ADDICTN_music-therapy-people-substance-use-disorder