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IMC Researcher Mette Steenberg receives grant from the Central Denmark Region

Time to Read - project on mental health effects of “Shared Reading”

Time to Read has in continuation to a development project been granted a 3-year funding period. The project will implement and document the mental health effects of “Shared Reading” as a prevention scheme for vulnerable adults in The Central Denmark Region. The project builds on a collaboration between Interacting Minds Centre, AU, The Danish Reading Society (Læseforeningen), Public Libraries and The Central Denmark Region.

We have turned, for inspiration, to the UK where advances are being to establish cross-disciplinary field of research merging Arts and Health. This field has emerged in response to the need for developing community-based cost-effective intervention forms to address the personal and socio economic challenges of depression and other mental health problems. Research within the field is currently concerned with providing an evidence base for the personal and social benefits of engagement in participatory arts-practices and developing yet more tailored interventions. One successful example of such an intervention form is “Shared Reading” (Billington et al., 2014).

Shared Reading is an intervention developed by The Reader Organisation, UK which, over the past 15 year, has proven a successful intervention form both in highly specialized psychiatric settings and community settings. Shared Reading is based on a reading aloud model in which a trained reading group facilitator engages participants in dialogue through open-ended questions. A study on the group dynamics of “shared reading” show that shared reading provides a laboratory for exercising social cognition, as group members engage in on-line processes of mentalization and receive and give immediate feed-back on “readings” (Steenberg et al., 2014, Steenberg 2016). 

The grant is 1,8 mio. kr. for the three year project period.

Contact: 

Postdoc Mette Steenberg, Interacting Minds Center and Læseforeningen

Associate Professor Nicolai Ladegaard, Department of Clinical Medicine - The Department of General Psychiatry