Music Therapy and
Parent-Infant Bonding
Oxford University Press, 2011
Jane Edwards (Ed.)
This is the first book to explore and describe the important role that music therapists can play in helping ensure successful attachment between parent and infant in vulnerable populations. It includes case studies, offering a personal account of how music therapy can help those vulnerable population. It provides an international perspective, exploring how music therapists across the world are helping improve the lives of parents and infants. The book builds on the groundbreaking work of 20th century attachment theorists and researchers (Bowlby, Ainsworth, and others) and on musical responses of infants, as well as on musical relating between parents and infants.
Chapters throughout the book are are illustrated with engaging case material. Many of the authors are world leaders in the area of music therapy to promote parent and infant bonding. Others are having their first opportunity to describe their work publicly in print. The focus in each chapter is on the need for this work, the theoretical underpinnings of the practice, and the music therapy practice itself.
The book is arranged in three sections. The first section covers work in therapy sessions with children and their parents. The second describes programmes where the music therapist leads a group of parents with their infants, such as the renowned 'Sing & Grow' in Australia. The final section presents work with medical patients and their families including in the neonatal intensive care unit, and for cancer patients.
"Edwards' new book makes a significant contribution to the music therapy literature base by being the first book on this important topic, bringing together complementary work on aspects of music in infancy as well as music therapy with families. Its publication fills an important gap and need for music therapy clinicians and researchers, as well as for music therapy students and professionals in related fields." - APA Review of Books
The book will be valuable for music therapy practitioners and students, and more broadly for all those in the field of infant mental health.
Contributors:
- Vicky Abad, Sing and Grow Playgroup Queensland, Australia and School of Early Childhood, Queensland University of Technology, Australia
- Dr Donna Berthelsen, School of Early Childhood, Queensland University of Technology, Australia
- Helen Bruderer, Social Worker Advanced, Maternity and Paediatrics Units, Nambour General Hospital, Nambour, Queensland, Australia
- Margareta Burrell, Coram Community Campus, UK
- Joanna Cunningham, Music Therapist and creator of 'The SMARTS' - an early intervention arts based behavioural support programme for 4 - 7 year olds
- Toni Day, National Director, Sing and Grow Project, Playgroup Queensland, Australia.
- Louise Docherty, Children's Cancer Centre, The Royal Children's Hospital, Australia
- Tiffany Drake, former Head of Music Therapy, Coram, London, UK (maternity leave)
- Professor Jane Edwards, Music and Health Research Group, University of Limerick, Ireland
- Dr Brigid Jordan, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne Department of Paediatrics, The University of Melbourne, Australia
- Karen Kelly, Milford Care Centre, Limerick, Ireland
- Dr Alison Ledger, Leeds Institute of Medical Education, University of Leeds, United Kingdom
- Dr Alison Levinge, Private Clinical Practice and Clinical Supervision with mothers
- Dr Joanne V. Loewy, The Louis Armstrong Center for Music & Medicine, USA
- Associate Professor Jan M. Nicholson, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute and Queensland University of Technology, Australia and Queensland University of Technology, Australia
- Dr Clare O'Callaghan, Department of Medicine, The University of Melbourne, Australia
- Dr Amelia Oldfield, Anglia Ruskin University, UK
- Dr Helen Shoemark, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute; The Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne, Australia
- Kate E. Williams, Playgroup Queensland, Australia and Queensland University of Technology, Australia
Available from:
Reviews excerpts
"Therapists are increasingly having to justify their work, particularly as early years centres face massive cuts in budgets. Newly qualified music therapists seeking work may also find this book useful, providing coherent arguments for a distinct role in parent-child interventions." - British Journal of Music Therapy, 2012
"This book provides the reader with an outstanding structure, in-depth descriptions of situations and interventions and responsible presentations of clinical and research material. This helps us to realise the vital importance of the creation of bonds of love with the parent in the beginning of life....This book is an important contribution to music therapy, family and society." - Elisabeth Georgiadi, Approaches: Music Therapy & Special Music Education, Dec 2012
"A major strength of the book is the inclusion of short clinical vignettes in all of the chapters which bring the work to life. The music therapy methods described are varied and reflect both cultural models of music therapy and the need to respond to a range of circumstances with different approaches I found it hugely inspiring and enjoyable and recommend it to anyone who is interested in the effects of music on children and on relationships." - Helen Loth, British Journal of Music Education, Jan 2013
'This book sensitively compiles contributions from music therapists across the world and offers an opportunity to reflect on and learn about music therapy in this distinctive area of practice. Edwards invites her readers to consider that supporting parent-infant bonding is a vital aim for music therapy in and of itself, and the contributing authors bring this to life through rich case descriptions that support Edwards' contention. For students and newly graduated music therapists, this book offers an abundance of background, theory and reality to support their understanding of parent-infant bonding.' - Grace Thompson, The Australian Journal of Music Therapy
"I can very much recommend this book for students, practitioners and researchers from music therapy, and also from adjacent disciplines including pedagogy, psychology, and psychiatry and all those interested in the field of music and parent-infant bonding." - Wolfgang Schmid, Nordic Journal of Music Therapy
