Reminiscence In Older Adults Research Articles

Systematization of a cognitive-communicative intervention based on reminiscence for older adults.

To determine the effect of the reminiscence-based cognitive-communicative intervention program (CCSP-R) on global cognitive processing and self-perception of subjective well-being. A purposive sample of 100 self-care elderly adults, with 65 composing the study group and 35 in the control group. The study group was subjected to the proposed program. The Wilcoxon test compared the outcome measures of global cognitive efficacy (MMSE) and subjective well-being (SWLS) before and after the program, whereas the Mann-Whitney U test compared the pre- and post-test differences between the two groups. A statistically significant difference was found between the pre- and post-test of the SWLS in the study group, but not in the control group. This result was replicated in the global cognitive efficacy variable. A difference between the groups occurred in both measures, with greater benefit for the group that received the intervention. The CCSP-R is a viable alternative for cognitive-communicative stimulation of functional order. The evidence of differences in performance supports its usefulness and validity for intervention in primary care or other similar contexts.

Social Reminiscence in Older Adults' Everyday Conversations: Automated Detection Using Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning.

BackgroundReminiscence is the act of thinking or talking about personal experiences that occurred in the past. It is a central task of old age that is essential for healthy aging, and it serves multiple functions, such as decision-making and introspection, transmitting life lessons, and bonding with others. The study of social reminiscence behavior in everyday life can be used to generate data and detect reminiscence from general conversations.ObjectiveThe aims of this original paper are to (1) preprocess coded transcripts of conversations in German of older adults with natural language processing (NLP), and (2) implement and evaluate learning strategies using different NLP features and machine learning algorithms to detect reminiscence in a corpus of transcripts.MethodsThe methods in this study comprise (1) collecting and coding of transcripts of older adults’ conversations in German, (2) preprocessing transcripts to generate NLP features (bag-of-words models, part-of-speech tags, pretrained German word embeddings), and (3) training machine learning models to detect reminiscence using random forests, support vector machines, and adaptive and extreme gradient boosting algorithms. The data set comprises 2214 transcripts, including 109 transcripts with reminiscence. Due to class imbalance in the data, we introduced three learning strategies: (1) class-weighted learning, (2) a meta-classifier consisting of a voting ensemble, and (3) data augmentation with the Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique (SMOTE) algorithm. For each learning strategy, we performed cross-validation on a random sample of the training data set of transcripts. We computed the area under the curve (AUC), the average precision (AP), precision, recall, as well as F1 score and specificity measures on the test data, for all combinations of NLP features, algorithms, and learning strategies.ResultsClass-weighted support vector machines on bag-of-words features outperformed all other classifiers (AUC=0.91, AP=0.56, precision=0.5, recall=0.45, F1=0.48, specificity=0.98), followed by support vector machines on SMOTE-augmented data and word embeddings features (AUC=0.89, AP=0.54, precision=0.35, recall=0.59, F1=0.44, specificity=0.94). For the meta-classifier strategy, adaptive and extreme gradient boosting algorithms trained on word embeddings and bag-of-words outperformed all other classifiers and NLP features; however, the performance of the meta-classifier learning strategy was lower compared to other strategies, with highly imbalanced precision-recall trade-offs.ConclusionsThis study provides evidence of the applicability of NLP and machine learning pipelines for the automated detection of reminiscence in older adults’ everyday conversations in German. The methods and findings of this study could be relevant for designing unobtrusive computer systems for the real-time detection of social reminiscence in the everyday life of older adults and classifying their functions. With further improvements, these systems could be deployed in health interventions aimed at improving older adults’ well-being by promoting self-reflection and suggesting coping strategies to be used in the case of dysfunctional reminiscence cases, which can undermine physical and mental health.

Study of aromas as reminiscence triggers in community-dwelling older adults in Japan.

Objective: This study investigates the presence or absence of reminiscence experiences in older adults when using aromas. Focusing on 40 scents familiar to Japanese people, our objective was to determine points of caution for aroma selection and use in reminiscence therapy.Materials and Methods: The participants were 118 community-dwelling older adults aged 65 years and older. They were asked about the experience of recalling the past in response to stimuli of 40 aromas on the Japanese version of the University of Pennsylvania Smell Identification Test (UPSIT-J). In addition, an olfactory visual analog scale (VAS) was used to evaluate olfactory function. Furthermore, a questionnaire-based survey was administered instead of asking participants to actually smell the odorants in the UPSIT-J.Results: At least 70% of the participants experienced recalling the past triggered by 16 aromas including sandalwood and yuzu fruit. Furthermore, 15 of the scents demonstrated a significant association with age, gender, and olfactory function.Conclusion: These results suggest the importance of considering method, age, and gender when selecting olfactory stimuli. In addition, frequently recalled aromas might evoke reminiscence in older adults.

The functions and value of reminiscence for older adults in long-term residential care facilities

ABSTRACTFor the many older adults living in long-term care facilities, the ability to connect with others, as well as with one’s own personal past, may be of particular value. Reflecting on the past and sharing reminiscences with others serves different psychosocial functions in various settings. This study examined the functions of reminiscence for long-term care residents in the United States (Mage = 86.5) by addressing the self-reported frequency of reminiscence, the counterparties involved, the overall purpose and value of reminiscence, and the relation to residents’ mental health and well-being. Results demonstrated that although some functions of reminiscence were comparable to those found in community-dwelling older adults, others were unique to the long-term care setting. Residents were most likely to reminisce alone and they found the experience enjoyable. They reported engaging in and enjoying reminiscence with family more than with fellow residents, and a subset desired increased opportunities to share memories with healthcare providers. Residents with lower morale and more depressive symptoms were more likely to engage in unhealthy styles of reminiscence. These findings suggest that interventions shaping reminiscence encounters may have positive outcomes for long-term care residents.

Rumination and reminiscence in older adults: implications for clinical practice.

Reminiscence is proposed as an important activity for well-being in late life but recent reviews highlight the differential outcomes of this behavior. If older adults engage in reminiscing as a natural process, but do so with a ruminative style of thinking, it may actually be detrimental to successful development and well-being. This project explored the relationship between rumination, reminiscence, mood, and psychosocial development. One hundred and fifty community dwelling older adults completed measures assessing these variables. As expected, increased rumination was related to increased depressed mood. Fifty-four of the participants completed a follow-up measure of depressed mood. Rumination also accounted for follow-up depressed mood beyond that explained by time-1 mood. The interaction between rumination and reminiscing significantly predicted future depressed mood after controlling for main effects and baseline mood. Further, this interaction significantly predicted overall psychosocial development. Implications for clinical practice are discussed.

Personality traits and existential concerns as predictors of the functions of reminiscence in older adults.

This study examines to what extent personality and existential constructs predict the frequency of reminiscence, in general, and its various functions, in particular. Eighty-nine older adults completed the NEO-Five Factor Inventory, the Life Attitude Profile--Revised, and the Reminiscence Functions Scale. Neuroticism predicted total reminiscence frequency, as well as reminiscence for self-understanding and ruminating about a negative past. Extraversion predicted total reminiscence frequency, as well as reminiscence for generating stimulation, conversation, and maintaining memories of departed loved ones. Openness to experience predicted total reminiscence frequency and reminiscence for addressing life meaning and death. Existential concerns, and in particular low desire to seek new challenges, added significant additional predictive power for total reminiscence frequency and for such uses as generating stimulation, preparing for death, and ruminating about the past. The discussion draws the implications of the finding that the combination of personality traits and existential concerns predicted the overall reminiscence frequency together with the intrapersonal functions of reminiscence.