Extending an emotionally gifted child's expression of empathy through developmental bibliotherapy

Developmental Bibliotherapy has been used to develop gifted students' and adults' understanding and expression of self-awareness and empathy. Researchers have failed, however, to implement the process of Developmental Bibliotherapy with participants below the age of nine years. The child participant involved in this study was a six-year-old gifted student. The purpose of the study was to investigate the process of Developmental Bibliotherapy as an effective intervention to focus the participant on her emotions, assist her to express these emotions and overcome her troubling issue of a current empathetic concern. The study provided qualitative data showing that when an emotionally gifted child with an empathetic concern participated in the process of Developmental Bibliotherapy she displayed an increased ability to express the emotion of Empathy.