Title: Interaction, Dementia and Engagement in Arts for Lifelong Learning (IDEAL)
Funder: Economic and Social Research Council

Abstract: IDEAL is a partnership between applied linguists and social gerontologists at Newcastle University (NU) and creative ageing organisations Equal Arts (EA, Newcastle) and Sunderland Culture (SC, Creative Age). The main objective for this partnership is to develop an innovative research-led training programme for artists and workshop organisers involved in participatory arts initiatives for people living with dementia (PwD). The proposed programme will ensure that such activities are optimally tuned to enhance the engagement of PwD, promoting agency, autonomy, social connectivity and well-being. As evidenced in a recent inquiry by an all-party parliamentary group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing (2017), this serves to improve the quality of life of the PwD and their carers, enabling them to remain active and socially connected for longer. EA has been providing some arts interventions for PwD and their carers. These have proved to be successful so far, but both EA and the artists delivering the workshops have noted the lack of research-informed training on effective communication strategies in these activities. As such, EA see an urgent need for the development of training materials for artists who are active in the social care sector, with insights from research that explores the interactional challenges of working with PwD. On this basis, EA approached NU with a request to draw in their expertise in communication research to further develop a suite of participatory arts initiatives for PwD, informed by research on effective communication involving PwD, carers and social care professionals (e.g., P.I. 2018, 2019, P.I & Co-I in review). The project objectives can be organised into different strands: new research, a training programme, knowledge exchange, scholarship: (1) To develop between the partners (NU/EA/SC) a workshop package to train artists who work with PwD, both regionally and nationally, to help them adopt best practice in communication and arts workshop management skills. (2) To offer a programme of workshops to artists and art-for-dementia organisations nationally, with an initial 4 open workshops held at NU (2021), others hosted at respective stakeholder organisations. These workshops offer a toolkit of communication strategies for promoting active, rich engagement from the PwD, for example how to structure instructions in arts activities, how to read the verbal and non-verbal signs from the PwD, and how to manage interactional trouble. (3) To produce a free, online training package for the benefit of arts practitioners and organisations who work with PwD but who are unable to attend workshops. This will be hosted on the EA website. This package will be subsequently scaled up for use by other social care organisations who work with PwD. (4) To maintain momentum in our research & practice partnerships to expand our knowledge of how arts activities for people living with dementia (PwD) are managed successfully. This knowledge exchange partnership has produced new insights into the challenges and benefits for PwD at different stages of the disease, and what interactional strategies work best for the artists and workshop participants. (5) case study research on 5 other arts interventions for PwD, organised by EA and SC, replicating the previous study for other types of setting in which the arts organisations are active. This will allow for testing previous findings and bolster the generalisability of the findings, for application in the training materials. (6) To produce a toolkit for evaluating arts-for-dementia programmes, which do not rely on post-hoc survey data conducted with carers and staff. (7) To use this research to inform regional and national policy on arts programmes developed for promoting well-being in PwD and their carers. (8) To use this research to continue to contribute internationally to scholarship on the role of the arts in promoting well-being for PwD and their carers.

Lay abstract: Over the past few years, researchers, governments and social enterprises have become increasingly involved in the development of interventions to improve the quality of life for people living with dementia (PwD). Arts activities such as arts & crafts workshops and art gallery guided tours have been identified as one effective way to give PwD a creative outlet, increased agency, and a reinvigorated sense of social identity. However, for the artists and social enterprises running such interventions, there is little available training on how best to communicate with PwD in order to maximise the benefits of these interventions. The IDEAL project will address this through collaborative partnership with Equal Arts and Sunderland Culture, two UK organisations who offer creative ageing workshop programmes to support people living with dementia-related cognitive decline and resulting social isolation. Based on research produced prior to, and as a result of, this funding, we will produce a training service - in the form of workshop packages and an online training programme - which will highlight and identify effective communication strategies for engaging PwD in a meaningful way in these activities. This would include examples of effective workshop activities and, more specifically, communication strategies, such as effective instruction-giving and effective evaluations of PwD work, based on real-world examples from a range of scenarios (i.e. when carers are present, when PwD are without carers, etc.) In this research, applied linguists and social gerontologists from Newcastle University are building on a previous case study carried out with partners at Sunderland Culture, to investigate effective workshop activities and good communicative practices in arts interventions for people living with dementia (PwD). Through video analysis of recordings of arts workshops, language and non-verbal conduct were analysed to identify the interactional strategies that workshop facilitators (and carers) use that result in increased, active participation, and which enable people living with dementia to contribute autonomously to the activity. These insights have been shared with the stakeholder organisation, and have featured in research dissemination activities internationally, with invited talks given in to relevant stakeholders and research centres in Denmark and Sweden (2019), data presentations given in Japan (2018), and findings presented at a leading international conference (Finland, 2019). As a result of this, the NU team has been awarded the next Atypical Interaction Conference 2022, a prestigious international meeting attracting 200-300 scholars from around the world, and will be representing NU at the British Council organised RENKEI meeting in Tokyo, on Healthy Ageing and Dementia (March 2021). The research dimension in the proposed project expands on the previous pilot study (in which one workshop setting was examined) to five new workshop settings in arts spaces across the Northeast of England. This will provide a more nuanced and detailed insight into effective activities, and related communication strategies, in such arts workshop settings, which will help to inform training materials more effectively. The workshop programme will initially be delivered across the Northeast of England, with the potential for further roll-out, and the online training programme will be made available (online and as hard copies to order) for wider distribution through Equal Arts, the internationally recognised "creative ageing charity providing arts and creative activities for older people and those living with dementia" (equalarts.org.uk/our-work/creative-age). Through research-informed training, this project will improve the quality of arts interventions for PwD, which will in turn improve the quality of life for both PwD, and their carers.

Research activity codes: 7.1 INDIVIDUAL CARE NEEDS
Health categories: NEUROLOGICAL