Let's read: Building allies through a bibliotherapy stuttering intervention.

Area of Science:

• Speech and Language Therapy
• Child Psychology
• Educational Interventions

Background:

• Peer attitudes can significantly impact the social experiences of children who stutter (CWS).
• School-based interventions offer a practical setting to foster positive social interactions and understanding.
• Bibliotherapy, using literature to facilitate discussion and empathy, has potential for attitude modification.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of a school-based bibliotherapy intervention in changing non-stuttering children's attitudes toward CWS.
• To assess the feasibility and ease of implementation of this bibliotherapy intervention within a school environment.

Main Methods:

• Fourth-grade students (n=26) participated in a four-week bibliotherapy program with guided discussions.
• The Peer Attitudes Toward Children who Stutter (PATCS) scale was administered pre- and post-intervention.
• Graduate student clinicians used the System Usability Scale (SUS) to rate intervention implementation ease.

Main Results:

• A statistically significant positive change in attitudes toward CWS was observed post-intervention.
• The bibliotherapy intervention demonstrated effectiveness in modifying peer attitudes within a short timeframe.
• Clinicians reported the intervention as "good" to "excellent" in terms of ease of implementation.

Conclusions:

• Bibliotherapy is an effective and feasible classroom intervention for improving peer attitudes toward stuttering.
• The intervention's success in four weeks suggests a viable method for clinicians to adopt a social model targeting the environment.
• This approach offers a practical strategy to foster a more inclusive school environment for CWS.