A team of researchers, including Carleton University’s Renate Ysseldyk, has received a Knowledge Mobilization Partnership Program grant from the Centre for Aging & Brain Health Innovation (CABHI) to support research on reducing social isolation in residential care settings. In particular, living in residential care can be accompanied by feelings of social isolation, loneliness, depression and a loss of life purpose or meaning. Thus, the research team will investigate the psychosocial and cognitive effects of two structured peer-support music programmes. Namely, the Java Music Club (for individuals living with either early dementia or no cognitive impairment), and the Java Memory Care (for individuals with mid-stage to advanced dementia).
Through this project, participants will gain the opportunity to restore two things that have been known to impact their well-being, by creating a new group-based social identity, and having an active role in the peer support process. Ultimately, the knowledge gained from this study may be mobilized, to provide other health care settings with the tools to run similar programmes to hopefully benefit more individuals living in residential care with dementia.
In collaboration with Zsofia Orosz (Bruyère Centre for Learning, Research and Innovation in Long-term Care), Dr. Tracy Luciani (Bruyère Continuing Care), Kristine Theurer (Founder & President Java Group Programs), and Drs. Catherine Haslam and Genevieve Dingle (The University of Queensland).