It's okay to not be okay but K-dramas are good for mental health. Here’s why

Are you a K-drama lover? Have you binged on Korean shows like ‘Crash Landing on You’ and ‘Descendants of the Sun’ multiple times? Then, here is some good news for you. According to a Korean-American expert, watching Korean dramas is likely to improve your mental health.

According to therapist Jeanie Chan, there are deeper reasons why Korean dramas, with high production values, top-notch acting and attractive stars, are popular. She believes that these shows have the power to heal cultural traumas and reconnect people with their own emotions with plotlines that show varying sentiments including grief and happiness.

The therapist maintains that watching K-dramas can enhance people’s ability to tackle real-life challenges since they show complex issues being effectively handled. “We all have family pressures and expectations, conflict, trauma, hope,” she said.

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Born in Korea and raised in the United States, Chang felt that K-dramas helped her reconnect with her roots, something that she had rejected as a child.

“Mental health is how you’re feeling, how you relate to others, psychologically, how your brain has been impacted by things. That’s mental health. We see that in a Korean drama.”

Why are K-dramas so popular?

There has been a surge in viewership of Korean dramas across the globe in the last few years, according to industry data. Interestingly, these dramas have found a market in major countries like the United States, where an upward trend of viewership was seen during the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Between 2019 and 2022, viewership of Korean television and movies increased six-fold on Netflix, its data showed, and Korean series are now the most watched non-English content on the platform.

American school teacher Jeanie Barry discovered K-drama via a family funeral when a friend recommended a series – 2020’s “It’s Okay to Not Be Okay” – she thought could help her after a difficult time. “There was something about it, the way that this culture deals with trauma, mental depression, just really struck a chord for me,” Barry, who had travelled to South Korea as part of a K-drama tour organised by therapist Chang, told AFP.

“I started to grieve when I had not been. There were a lot of tears during that drama, but it also made me see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel,” she said. Immediately hooked, Barry said she had watched 114 K-dramas since discovering the genre and effectively given up watching English-language television. “They let me soften my heart,” she said.

Fellow tour member and American Erin McCoy said she had struggled with depression since she was a teenager, but K-drama helped her manage her symptoms. With depression, “when you live with it that long, you’re just numb and so you don’t really feel bad necessarily but you don’t ever feel good either,” she said.

“You just don’t feel anything,” she said, adding that K-drama allowed her to experience emotions again. “There’re so many highs and lows in every one of them, and as I felt the characters’ emotions, it just helped me relate to my own more,” she said. “I feel like I was able to express and experience emotion again.”

How is binge-watching K-drama similar to other forms of therapy?

The idea that binge-watching K-dramas can improve mental health might seem unlikely, but according to an expert, it aligns with long-established therapy concepts. Many consider that K-dramas are actually like art therapy. “Watching Korean dramas can be beneficial for anxiety and depression from the viewpoint of art therapy,” Im Su-geun, head of a psychiatry clinic in Seoul, told AFP.

First used in the 1940s, art therapy initially involved patients drawing, but evolved to incorporate other artistic activities. “Visual media like Korean dramas have significant strengths that align well with psychotherapy,” he said.

K-drama, or television and cinema generally, can help viewers “gain insights into situations from a new perspective, fostering healthy values and providing solutions to their issues,” he said.

He further said, “It is unlikely to be prescribed by a doctor, but if a therapist were to recommend a specific drama that related to the patient’s case, it could be helpful.” For example, it can provide a roadmap for patients “facing specific situations, such as breakups or loss,” he said.

With inputs from AFP