Storytelling reduces pain, stress in hospitalised children: Study

Anew research has shown for the first time that storytelling is capable of providing physiological and emotional benefits to children in Intensive Care Units (ICUs). The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the official scientific journal of the National Academy of Sciences of the US. It was carried out by the D’Or Institute for Research and Education (IDOR) and the Federal University of ABC (UFABC). The study was led by Guilherme Brockington, PhD, from UFABC, and Jorge Moll, MD, PhD, from IDOR.

“During storytelling, something happens that we call ‘narrative transportation’. The child, through fantasy, can experience sensations and thoughts that transport him or her to another world, a place that is different from the hospital room and is, therefore, far from the aversive conditions of hospitalization,” affirmed Guilherme Brockington, PhD, and lead author of the study.

Storytelling is an immemorial practice of humanity. Legends, religions, and social values have spanned millennia through orality and writing. The most current best-selling cinematographic scripts and novels captivate the audiences through the same mechanism: listening to a good story is moving from one reality to another. This movement, driven by imagination, can create empathy for events and characters that fluctuate according to the interpretation of each individual. Considering the psychological and biological processes that occur during, and after listening to a story, the study investigators came up with the idea of seeking scientific evidence for the effects of storytelling on critically hospitalized children.

In total, 81 children were selected, aged between 2 and 7 years and with similar clinical conditions, such as respiratory problems caused by asthma, bronchitis, or pneumonia. 41 of them participated in a group in which storytellers read children’s stories for 25 to 30 minutes, while in a control group, 40 children were told riddles offered by the same professionals and during the same length of time.

To compare the effects of the two interventions, saliva samples were collected from each participant before and after each session to analyse the oscillations of cortisol and oxytocin - hormones related to stress and empathy, respectively.

In addition, the children took a subjective test to evaluate the level of pain they were feeling before and after participating in the activities. They also performed a free word association task by relating their impressions about 7 cards illustrated with elements from the hospital context (Nurse, Doctor, Hospital, Medicine, Patient, Pain, and Book).

The outcomes were positive for all groups, as both interventions reduced the level of cortisol and increased the production of oxytocin in all the children analysed, while the sensation of pain and discomfort was also mitigated, according to the evaluation of the children themselves.