Art therapy is a psycho therapeutic discipline using plastic and graphic art expression as a means of expressing thoughts and feelings that an individual may be unable or unwilling to verbalize (Di Maria pp). Each client's diagnosis, needs, interests, and capabilities are formulated in the goals of the therapy (Di Maria pp). Art therapists encourage their clients to express personal concerns through the creation of art, and the work can be viewed as a tangible record of progress, as well as an indication of where further therapeutic interventions should take place (Di Maria pp). This art may server as a springboard for verbal communication and also a source of pride of accomplishment for the client (Di Maria pp). Audrey Di Maria says that children often come to their first art therapy session expecting to fail because they are afraid of messing up or that their work will be compared unfavorably to work by other children (Di Maria pp). As an art therapist it is important to help children see how special and extraordinary their own ideas are (Di Maria pp). The goal of art therapy is to celebrate the diversity of each child's unique crease and help raise his or hers sense of self-esteem (Di Maria pp). .

             Children's drawings may provide information about perceptual-motor abilities and developmental level of the child, however children's drawings are also used to assess possible sexual abuse (Drawings pp). Since emotionally disturbed children are believed to reflect their problems in art work, the drawings of abused children is assumed to differ from those of non-abused children (Drawings pp). Any number of approaches, whether free drawing, house-tree-person, draw-a-person, and kinetic family drawings, are used and qualitative features of the drawings, such as colors, size and detail of body parts, as well as the shape of the figures may be interpreted in terms of the presence or absence of sexual abuse (Drawings pp).