An interactive shared reading intervention designed for preverbal infants: A feasibility study exploring early language and cognitive development

Abstract

Creating an environment suitable for language acquisition through shared reading significantly contributes to improving a child's language development and parent–child relationship. Reading in an interactive way, such as dialogic reading, is favorable. Nevertheless, dialogic reading is designed for children above the age of two and shared reading is recommended to start during the child's first year. The present study aimed to explore the feasibility of an interactive shared reading intervention, inspired by dialogic reading, where the reading techniques were designed to complement infants’ preverbal developmental level. The study further intended to explore its preliminary effect on infants’ cognitive and language development. Eleven parent–infant dyads participated, bi-monthly, in four in-depth intervention sessions where the shared reading techniques were modeled. Between sessions, parents and infants engaged in shared reading using these techniques. Post-intervention interviews served to reflect the feasibility of the intervention. Infant cognitive and language assessments were conducted pre- and post-intervention using BAYLEY-III and CSBS DP ITC. Favorable results regarding feasibility and infant language development were found, however, for cognitive development the results were non-significant. We discuss clinical considerations and the scope for conducting future studies.