Attending Live Theater Performances Benefits Students
Since 2003, Alec Doyle has served as executive director of the Colonial Theatre Group in Keene, New Hampshire. Responsible for presenting culturally and artistically diverse work to the Keene community, Alec Doyle also oversees a school series and educational activities to ensure that the theatre’s work reaches local youth.
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According to a study published in 2014 by researchers at the University of Arkansas, students who attend live theater performances as part of their education, deepen their literary background and develop stronger feelings of empathy and tolerance for others.
The study, published in Education Next, offered free tickets to high-quality theatrical productions for students in grades 7 through 12. Approximately six weeks after the students attended the performances, they completed content knowledge questionnaires, as well as an emotion identification activity.
When compared to students in a control group, those who attended a live production received significantly better scores in plot retention and understanding vocabulary used in the performance. Students also proved more capable of recognizing emotions based on eye expression, as tested through the Reading the Mind in the Eyes assessment. This test, originally developed for autism evaluations, showed that students who viewed live theater were more attuned to the feelings of others.
