Shared book reading and promoting social and emotional competences in educational settings: a narrative review

Over the last 20 years plenty of studies have shown the association between the development of social and emotional skills on the one hand, and wellbeing, peer popularity and school achievement on the other hand. Against this background, numerous intervention studies have been implemented especially in school contexts. Given the importance of an early enhancement of such skills, following a narrative review method we set out to examine the impact of shared book reading interventions on the social and emotional competence of children attending nursery and preschool settings. We conducted a comprehensive data search based on PubMed, Google Scholar, Scopus, and Web of Science. We identified 15 studies, five focusing on the nursery setting and ten to the preschool environment. We illustrated the main characteristics of the studies, highlighting the most significant results. In conclusion the paper both provides some considerations on the reviewed studies and suggests future lines for research.