Group-based instrumental musical training to enhance resilience among school-aged children from low-income families: A pilot randomised waitlist controlled trial.
Ankie Tan Cheung, Laurie Long Kwan Ho, William Ho Cheung Li and 4 others
PMID 38481006WHAT IT FOUND
Children from low-income families who received group instrumental music training showed greater improvement in resilience than waitlisted controls, with lower depressive symptoms, higher self-esteem and better quality of life.
Pilot evidence, so treat as feasibility signal.
Key findings
01Children in the music training group had a significantly greater improvement in resilience than waitlisted children: mean change 6.1 versus 1.9 points on the 10 to 40 RS10 scale.
02The training group also had larger mean changes than the waitlist group in depressive symptoms (decrease of 7.2 versus 0.7 points on 0 to 60), self-esteem (4.2 versus 1.7 points on 10 to 40) and quality of life (9.0 versus 2.6 points on 0 to 100).
03The programme was feasible: of 69 children assessed, 64 consented, 32 were randomised to each group, 96.9% were retained, and no adverse events were reported.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The trial was a pilot with 64 randomised children and single-site recruitment, so it cannot establish that the programme works. Outcomes were self-reported by children, which may introduce response bias. The waitlist control was not an active control, so it does not isolate the specific effect of music training. It is unclear whether effects depended on the instrument learned, because children used keyboard, ukulele or guitar. Follow-up was only immediately after the 6-month intervention, so longer-term effects were not assessed. Parental distress and parent-child relationship were not measured quantitatively. The programme was delivered by musicians, not by nurses or other clinicians, so the paper does not test a nursing intervention.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The supplied metadata lists non-U.S. government research support, but the article text does not name a funder.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that instrumental music training is proven to improve resilience in children from low-income families. This was a small pilot with waitlist controls, self-reported outcomes and immediate post-test only, so the findings are preliminary.