Many Americans are members of book clubs and there is a good reason for this. If you are looking for activities that will help your loved ones improve their mental health, book clubs should be a priority for you. Here are some of the reasons to encourage your loved one to join a book club.
Social Interaction
Research has shown that social engagement can help prevent or slow down memory loss and other brain degenerative conditions. Human beings are designed to be social and the lack of human interaction can be terrible for our health. It is no coincidence that one of the worst ways to punish people in a prison setting is to put them in solitary confinement. When we interact with other people, our brains instantly produce feel-good hormones which in turn reduce the incidence of depression and stress.
Book clubs are all about socialization and this will be very beneficial for your loved one. With the Covid-19 pandemic still raging, there are options to physical meetings such as video calls.
Mental Stimulation
Book clubs are an effective way of getting your loved one to read more books, which in turn provides immense mental stimulation, and is one of the ways to help your loved ones have better mental health. This is to ensure that their minds are always stimulated. This is because reading books requires one to remember details which in turn helps keep the brain functions as healthy as possible and reduce chances of memory loss. A book club also allows your loved one to get into the habit of reading books while taking notes to enable them to discuss it during a book club session.
Finally, the discussions during the book club session are also a great way to keep your loved one engaged and mentally stimulated. They have to remember details about what they read and explain them to the group as well as their views about them. This entire process is very beneficial in getting your loved one to keep his or her brain cells active.
Learning New Knowledge
Reading a wide variety of books helps to improve one’s knowledge and nothing makes sure that this happens as effectively as a book club. This is because they help one get into the discipline of reading books that are beyond one’s comfort zone. We all have the kind of books we love to read and over the years, we get comfortable with some genres and writers. Book clubs bring people with different tastes in books together. Since everyone has to suggest a book that the group will read, it means that your loved one will probably get to read authors and genres that they have never read before. This means more learning.
Another advantage of joining a book club is the fact that it does not need much input apart from reading the books. Regardless of how mobile your loved one is, this is an activity that can be undertaken by just about anyone. Even those who struggle with their sight can listen to audiobooks to avoid straining their eyes.
