Designing Nostalgic Tangible User Interface Application for Elderly People

Nostalgic conversations: The co-production of an intervention package for people living with dementia and their spouse

Objectives

Nostalgic memories are more social than other forms of autobiographical recall, often refer to atypical events, express more positive affect and reflect life as meaningful. Recalling a nostalgic (compared to ordinary) memory increases self-esteem, self-growth, meaning in life and social connectedness for people living with dementia. We set two objectives: to work with people living with dementia to develop an intervention based on nostalgia, and to assess whether couples could engage in nostalgic conversations.

Method

Our research fell into three phases. Initially, we consulted with people living with dementia and with carers to identify the parameters for a nostalgic intervention. From this, we drafted a workbook that contained triggers for nostalgic conversations, which we then took back to the public contributors for refinement. Finally, we trialled the workbook over 5 weeks with six couples, each of which included a person living with dementia. We assessed pre- and post-intervention self-esteem, self-growth, meaning in life and social connectedness for participants with dementia and social connectedness for carers. We then calculated Reliable Change Index scores and established levels of clinically significant change. We also interviewed couples at the end of the intervention to explore its implementation and acceptability.

Results

All six couples could identify nostalgic memories, with five couples successfully integrating the nostalgic conversations into their day-to-day lives. A sixth couple found it difficult to engage fully with the intervention, but still considered it useful. All six couples manifested a reliable change in at least one outcome, with one couple showing reliable change across three outcomes.

Conclusion

The psychological benefits of nostalgia have been robustly demonstrated in laboratory-based studies. This co-production of an intervention that sets nostalgic recall into the context of a conversation has clinical potential but requires further investigation through a larger study.

The Content of Nostalgic Memories Among People Living with Dementia

Although dementia may affect the reliability of autobiographical memories, the psychological properties of nostalgic memories may be preserved. We compared the content of nostalgic (n = 36) and ordinary (n = 31) narratives of 67 participants living with dementia. Narratives were rated according to their self-oriented, social, and existential properties, as well as their affective content. Social properties and affective content were assessed using a linguistic word count procedure. Compared to the ordinary narratives described in the control condition, nostalgic narratives described a typical events, expressed more positive affect, and had more expressions of self-esteem and self-continuity. They were also rated higher on companionship, connectedness and the closeness of relationships, and reflected life as being meaningful. Despite their cognitive impairment, people living with dementia experience nostalgia in similar ways to cognitively healthy adults, with their nostalgic narratives containing self-oriented, social, and existential properties.