Assessing the intrinsic value, and health and well-being benefits, for individual and community, of The Reader Organisation's Volunteer Reader Scheme.
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Liverpool
Department Name: Institute of Psychology Health & Society
Abstract
This project will investigate the value to individual and community of the BIG Lottery-funded Volunteer Reader Scheme, which has been developed by award-winning charitable social enterprise, The Reader Organisation (TRO), as part of its pioneering outreach project, Get into Reading (GIR).
TRO's mission is to create environments where personal responses to books are freely shared in reading communities in every area of life. The GIR model is based on small groups (2-12 people), reading aloud together short stories, novels and poetry. GIR is distinguished from conventional reading groups by its shared-reading method: the literature exists live and performatively in the room; regular breaks in the reading encourage participants to reflect on what is being read, and weigh its language and meaning, often in implicit or explicit relation to their own life-experience, while readers always control their own involvement, contributing as much or as little as they choose. GIR currently delivers over 360 groups, in health and social care settings (community centres, libraries, homeless shelters, schools, hospitals, offices, doctors' surgeries, prisons, drug rehab units and care homes) across the UK. The related Volunteer Reader Scheme engages 70 people at risk of, or suffering from, mental health difficulties, isolation or unemployment in a range of volunteering opportunities at all levels of TRO. Volunteer roles operate at the heart of organisation's reading mission and whilst often still being members of reading groups, volunteers are further involved as: Office Assistants, preparing reading resources for reading groups; Reading Group Assistants, working alongside reading group facilitators: Reading Friends, reading weekly, one-to-one, with isolated older people; Reading Group Facilitators, running weekly reading groups in Residential Care Homes or with the elderly. Volunteers are fully trained and supported by TRO staff, receiving regular feedback and recognition of their achievements and are offered potential for role development: reading-group members may become volunteers; volunteers may become interns or apprentices; apprentices may become employees.
This study will build on the existing collaboration between The Centre for Research into Reading, Information and Linguistic Systems (CRILS) at the University of Liverpool, and its third sector partner, TRO, to develop innovative, interdisciplinary literary and social scientific methodologies for capturing multi-dimensional components of the reading experience. In two separate yet related and concurrent studies, the research will seek (1) to identify the unique value of shared reading as it is actually experienced by the volunteers, as a representative section of vulnerable and needy individuals, as well as examining the relationship of this intrinsic value to collateral benefits. Through comparison of a GIR group with a built environment discussion group, via analysis of transcribed audio-recordings, this study will test the hypothesis that serious literature has power to create both individual meaningfulness and a strongly interactive small community; (2) to test the efficacy of the movement from, and inter-relation between, reading group-membership and future facilitation of reading groups, by comparing the experience of volunteers as continuing group-members and as developing group-helpers, gaining increased master. Dynamic and diverse volunteer case studies will be compiled, via interviews, observations, questionnaires, and these will be cross-referenced with routine audit data, to establish the connection between intrinsic literary affect and individual mental health and community well-being. This study will also consider how TRO's recent acquisition of an International Reading and Wellbeing centre, Calderstones Park Mansion House, may serve as a future Merseyside hub to create a larger community of volunteers engaged in reader and other-related activities.
TRO's mission is to create environments where personal responses to books are freely shared in reading communities in every area of life. The GIR model is based on small groups (2-12 people), reading aloud together short stories, novels and poetry. GIR is distinguished from conventional reading groups by its shared-reading method: the literature exists live and performatively in the room; regular breaks in the reading encourage participants to reflect on what is being read, and weigh its language and meaning, often in implicit or explicit relation to their own life-experience, while readers always control their own involvement, contributing as much or as little as they choose. GIR currently delivers over 360 groups, in health and social care settings (community centres, libraries, homeless shelters, schools, hospitals, offices, doctors' surgeries, prisons, drug rehab units and care homes) across the UK. The related Volunteer Reader Scheme engages 70 people at risk of, or suffering from, mental health difficulties, isolation or unemployment in a range of volunteering opportunities at all levels of TRO. Volunteer roles operate at the heart of organisation's reading mission and whilst often still being members of reading groups, volunteers are further involved as: Office Assistants, preparing reading resources for reading groups; Reading Group Assistants, working alongside reading group facilitators: Reading Friends, reading weekly, one-to-one, with isolated older people; Reading Group Facilitators, running weekly reading groups in Residential Care Homes or with the elderly. Volunteers are fully trained and supported by TRO staff, receiving regular feedback and recognition of their achievements and are offered potential for role development: reading-group members may become volunteers; volunteers may become interns or apprentices; apprentices may become employees.
This study will build on the existing collaboration between The Centre for Research into Reading, Information and Linguistic Systems (CRILS) at the University of Liverpool, and its third sector partner, TRO, to develop innovative, interdisciplinary literary and social scientific methodologies for capturing multi-dimensional components of the reading experience. In two separate yet related and concurrent studies, the research will seek (1) to identify the unique value of shared reading as it is actually experienced by the volunteers, as a representative section of vulnerable and needy individuals, as well as examining the relationship of this intrinsic value to collateral benefits. Through comparison of a GIR group with a built environment discussion group, via analysis of transcribed audio-recordings, this study will test the hypothesis that serious literature has power to create both individual meaningfulness and a strongly interactive small community; (2) to test the efficacy of the movement from, and inter-relation between, reading group-membership and future facilitation of reading groups, by comparing the experience of volunteers as continuing group-members and as developing group-helpers, gaining increased master. Dynamic and diverse volunteer case studies will be compiled, via interviews, observations, questionnaires, and these will be cross-referenced with routine audit data, to establish the connection between intrinsic literary affect and individual mental health and community well-being. This study will also consider how TRO's recent acquisition of an International Reading and Wellbeing centre, Calderstones Park Mansion House, may serve as a future Merseyside hub to create a larger community of volunteers engaged in reader and other-related activities.
Planned Impact
1.The immediate primary beneficiaries of this project will be the participants in the Volunteer Reader Scheme. Those directly involved in the research process - through co-construction of questionnaires and collaborative compilation of individual case studies - will thereby be encouraged to engage in deepened and enriched reflection on their volunteer experience as well as develop and contribute in new ways and at new levels of self and community. The production of high quality research also has potential to benefit reader volunteers in the longer term, by providing evaluative evidence for future funding of the volunteer scheme.
2.The project will benefit The Reader Organisation by:
a.Assessing the vital and intrinsic value components of TRO's core cultural activity - shared reading, specifically TRO's pioneering 'Get into Reading' model.
b.Identifying the relationship between the intrinsic value of shared reading and the known and unknown outcomes of TRO in terms of health and well-being, at both individual and community levels.
c.Delivering robust evaluation of a volunteer model which TRO seeks to embed across the organisation's activity, structurally and regionally, thereby influencing TRO's future volunteer strategy.
d.Contributing to the evidence base for securing future commissions of both Get into Reading and the Volunteer Reader Scheme, particularly through the emphasis on recovery and resilience.
3.The benefits to TRO can potentially be extended to TRO's associates in the volunteer venture and beyond:
a.Mersey Care NHS Mental Health Trust is one of TRO's partners in the initiative to transform the Calderstones Park Mansion House into an International Centre for Reading and Wellbeing (preferred leaseholder status for which purpose has recently been granted to TRO by Liverpool City Council). Mersey Care regards the Calderstones Project as an opportunity to redevelop volunteering at all levels of its own service. As one of only three trusts of its kind in the country providing the entire range of specialist mental health services, Mersey Care's volunteering model is likely to influence mental services elsewhere in the UK.
b.Wirral Metropolitan Council have implemented TRO's volunteering programme at Leasowe Library as a pilot project for developing a new model library which, if successful, will be replicated across the borough with the active support of Wirral MBC. This model has potential to shape future national policy re Volunteering and Libraries.
3.The contribution to public services of voluntary organisations and those that support volunteering has never been higher on the national agenda, or more keenly scrutinised and celebrated. Following the recent passing of the Social Value Act (Jan 2013), which legally requires commissioners to take into account social value when taking decisions about how to deliver public services, Sir Stuart Etherington, Chief Executive of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, described third sector enterprises which involve volunteers as 'frequently the most expert organisations in their fields, with the skills and the drive to create genuinely better services'. As a BIG-Lottery-funded volunteer scheme, TRO's example has the potential to become a flagship model for volunteering schemes in a range of cultural and health sectors. Robust research in respect of TRO's model will allow examples of best practice to influence existing arts in health and arts in the community initiatives as well laying the foundations for the development of future schemes. This research will also potentially encourage public-funded cultural institutions - art galleries, museums, orchestras - to look beyond conventional social groupings for volunteer recruitment, to include, for example, at-risk teenagers and care-leavers.
2.The project will benefit The Reader Organisation by:
a.Assessing the vital and intrinsic value components of TRO's core cultural activity - shared reading, specifically TRO's pioneering 'Get into Reading' model.
b.Identifying the relationship between the intrinsic value of shared reading and the known and unknown outcomes of TRO in terms of health and well-being, at both individual and community levels.
c.Delivering robust evaluation of a volunteer model which TRO seeks to embed across the organisation's activity, structurally and regionally, thereby influencing TRO's future volunteer strategy.
d.Contributing to the evidence base for securing future commissions of both Get into Reading and the Volunteer Reader Scheme, particularly through the emphasis on recovery and resilience.
3.The benefits to TRO can potentially be extended to TRO's associates in the volunteer venture and beyond:
a.Mersey Care NHS Mental Health Trust is one of TRO's partners in the initiative to transform the Calderstones Park Mansion House into an International Centre for Reading and Wellbeing (preferred leaseholder status for which purpose has recently been granted to TRO by Liverpool City Council). Mersey Care regards the Calderstones Project as an opportunity to redevelop volunteering at all levels of its own service. As one of only three trusts of its kind in the country providing the entire range of specialist mental health services, Mersey Care's volunteering model is likely to influence mental services elsewhere in the UK.
b.Wirral Metropolitan Council have implemented TRO's volunteering programme at Leasowe Library as a pilot project for developing a new model library which, if successful, will be replicated across the borough with the active support of Wirral MBC. This model has potential to shape future national policy re Volunteering and Libraries.
3.The contribution to public services of voluntary organisations and those that support volunteering has never been higher on the national agenda, or more keenly scrutinised and celebrated. Following the recent passing of the Social Value Act (Jan 2013), which legally requires commissioners to take into account social value when taking decisions about how to deliver public services, Sir Stuart Etherington, Chief Executive of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, described third sector enterprises which involve volunteers as 'frequently the most expert organisations in their fields, with the skills and the drive to create genuinely better services'. As a BIG-Lottery-funded volunteer scheme, TRO's example has the potential to become a flagship model for volunteering schemes in a range of cultural and health sectors. Robust research in respect of TRO's model will allow examples of best practice to influence existing arts in health and arts in the community initiatives as well laying the foundations for the development of future schemes. This research will also potentially encourage public-funded cultural institutions - art galleries, museums, orchestras - to look beyond conventional social groupings for volunteer recruitment, to include, for example, at-risk teenagers and care-leavers.
Publications
Philip Davis
(2020)
Reading for Life: CRILS and The Reader
Longden E
(2015)
Shared Reading: assessing the intrinsic value of a literature-based health intervention.
in Medical humanities
Davis
(2020)
Reading
Corcoran R
(2017)
The psychological benefits of cooperative place-making: a mixed methods analyses of co-design workshops
in CoDesign
Title | Films for volunteers wishing to improve good practice in running shrewd reading groups |
Description | This is covered in the follow-on funding listed separately. It also includes a software programme in development for active reading of poetry and seeing the mental connections within the the poem's development down the page. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2018 |
Impact | Increased good practice; increased recognition nationally an internationally of the intervention and its benefits |
Title | Films of shared reading |
Description | 9 films of between 30-45 minutes, showing the dynamics of shared reading. Three cameras were used in order to be able to look at any group member at any given time. The videos are mainly divided into two halves: first, excerpts from a session; second, reflective comments on that session by the group-leader with reprise of key moments and analysis of practice. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2018 |
Impact | This is having large-scale impact at The Reader in training staff and volunteers. it has attracted international interest (launched at an international conference in Stavanger) in terms of both developing practice in a variety of countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Germany, USA, Canada) and encouraging empirical research into the processes and dynamics of shared reading. |
Description | The benefits of shared reading aloud in terms of mental health and well-being. These include the creation of altenrative small social communities involving closer personal, emotional and cognitive ties than is usual in society, as a result of the force of literature; the involving of reappraisal mechanisms in thinking such that participants are no longer stuck in default positions; the active use of reading in going beyond the passively given nature of experience and in creatively employing so-called negative experiences for more than negative purposes. The follow-on grant (see AH/P014356/1) has enabled us to produce (1) training films which have given us further insight into practical processes in the intervention and developed further techniques for demonstrating these on film (2) a poetry app, in development, to enable better active reading of poetry for groups and individuals for further public dissemination in due course |
Exploitation Route | In terms of further research into reading groups, including more quantitative analysis with larger numbers of participants. Further analysis of data we already possess concerning self-report on health and well-being; also further linguistic analysis of videos and transcripts gathered in this research. Use of the cross-over group design to compare shared reading with other kinds of reading (e.g. newspapers or self-help books) and/or with the effectiveness of CBT Volunteering. Educational inter-active development of reading poetry as a way of thinking |
Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Education,Healthcare,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
URL | https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/humanities-social-sciences-health-medicine-technology/reading-literature-and-society/ |
Description | At a major dissemination event in London in 30 September. At sundry literary festivals in 2014 - Oxford, Swindon, Edinburgh, Lake District - as well as for training purposes inside The Reader Organisation. Printed brochure comprising shortened version of report sent to interested parties/stakeholder. Interest from media (Radio 4 and national newspapers) |
First Year Of Impact | 2014 |
Sector | Healthcare,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
Impact Types | Cultural,Societal |
Description | AHRC Cultural Value Project Follow-On Funding |
Amount | £100,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 04/2017 |
End | 05/2018 |
Description | Mersey Care Research and Development Fund |
Amount | £150,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 01/2015 |
End | 12/2018 |
Description | International Week, The Reader |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Bringing together practitioners from Europe who are interested into brining Shared Reading into their own professions (as librarians, teachers, health care workers). |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
Description | AHRC networking workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | A workshop on a contemporary example of communal reading practices, for a Reading Communities: Past and Present cultural engagement network. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
Description | Arts and Health Workshop, BBC Salford |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | 'Taster' reading group held for BBC employees as part of arts and health event. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | Edinburgh International Book Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | In-Service Training, The Reader Organisation |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Third sector organisations |
Results and Impact | This was a series of in-service training workshops for project workers employed by The Reader Organisation. Using video footage of the shared reading groups we had produced as part the AHRC Cultural Value project, we presented our findings, together with specific instances within the reading groups which allowed for discussion and reflection upon projects workers' own delivery of the groups. Feedback was universally positive - 'refreshing', 'inspirational', 'rewarding'. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | Keynote Lecture, INTAR (International Network Toward Alternatives and Recovery) conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | 300 + INTAR members or interested health professionals/patients/carers attended this plenary lecture which demonstrated the shared reading model investigated in the AHRC Cultural value project, using video footage, and drew attention to salient findings in respect of individual and community health. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
URL | http://intar.org/category/conferences/ |
Description | Keynote Lecture, Tampere University, Finland |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Around 150 librarians or professional librarians from across Europe attended, and 10 attendees have requested information about further research and training opportunities. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
Description | Mersey Care Grand Round |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Presentation on findings of the AHRC Cultural Value project, using video footage, for Mersey Care NHS Mental Health Trust for psychiatrists and mental health specialists. Led directly to a request from a Mersey Care psychiatrist for a research collaboration in relation to patients who self-harm. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | On Reading: Besides the Lakes Literary Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | On Reading: Swindon Literary Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | On reading Durham Literary Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | On reading" Oxford Literary festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | On reading: Chipping Norton Literary Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | Presentation of Cultural Value Report |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Literary festival - to show clips of shared reading groups and discuss what processes and mechanisms were involved Invited audience |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2014 |
Description | Seminar with academics and policy-makers, Oslo, Norway |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Seminar for interested academics and professionals; meetings with national politicians. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
Description | The Art of Social Prescribing, Institute of Cultural Capital, Liverpool |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Presentation using video footage of reading groups produced as part of the AHRC Cultural Value Project, which summarised findings, and reported specifically on the qualitative methodology this project had pioneered for the capturing of mental health benefit for practitioners. Led directly to an invitation to model shared reading at a BBC Salford Arts and Health event. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
URL | http://iccliverpool.ac.uk/?research=the-art-of-social-prescribing-informing-policy-on-creative-inter... |