Multidisciplinary Team, Including UTA Librarian, Receives Six-Figure Grant for Alzheimer’s Study

The University of Texas at Arlington Libraries congratulates Scholarly Communications librarian Brooke Troutman and her collaborators—Dr. Noelle Fields, Dr. Ling Xu, Dr. Kathryn Daniel, and Dr. Daisha Cipher—on their recent grant award from the RRF Foundation for Aging.

Their two-year project, called “Intergenerational connections: Reminiscence and digital storytelling to improve social and emotional well-being of older adults with [Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia (ADRD)],” received more than $169,000 to explore the impact of reminiscence therapy and creation of digital memoirs on those diagnosed with ADRD.

“We are immensely proud of Brooke and her co-grantees on this award and project,” said Rebecca Bichel, dean of UTA Libraries. “UTA Libraries is honored to collaborate with partners across campus on important projects like this one that advance scientific understanding of the human condition and continue to innovate as only Mavericks can do.”

This project will pair university students with elderly dementia patients to encourage a therapeutic dialogue about childhood and other memories. The students will then create digital projects that reimagine or otherwise document these memories in one of many storytelling modes.

Digital storytelling is a technology that uses a 2-5 minutes audio-visual clip combining text, images, music, photographs, voice-over narration, and other audio. Troutman will assist the university students in their digital storytelling interventions and archive the final creations using tools available at UTA Libraries.

“It’s an honor to be a part of this project, and I am excited to get to work,” Troutman said. “The digital storytelling piece will provide our subjects a way to share their story with others in a therapeutic setting. It is a way for us to do some good.”

Xu and Fields are the principal investigators on the grant and have been collaborating on research projects since they joined UTA in 2013. They will oversee all aspects of the project, including recruiting and training the participating UTA students to work with the older adult participants—an innovative approach—as well as observing the impact of the reminiscence and digital storytelling program on homebound older adults with early-stage dementia.

“Reminiscence is typically implemented by trained professionals (e.g. social workers, nurses), however, there has been growing interest in using trained volunteers due to staffing shortages and the costs associated with reminiscence programs,” Xu said. “Student organizations from a variety of disciplines across the UTA campus (e.g. social work, nursing, liberal arts, engineering, and kinesiology) wrote letters of support for the study and have agreed to work with us on reaching their student members for potential participation in this study.”

Fields says the COVID-19 pandemic has also highlighted the need for their project.

“Given that social isolation disproportionately affected older adult prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, there are growing concerns that prolonged periods of social distancing may result in negative effects long after quarantine,” Fields said. “Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has also led to increased negative stereotypes about older adults. Given these current issues, there is an even more pressing need to increase social connectivity and combat ageism through interventions such as the funded study.”

Unexpected precautions will be taken due to the pandemic—a telephone-based intervention, as opposed to face-to-face, will be implemented, as well as virtual student training.

Daniel is a key member of the interdisciplinary research team. She has expertise in interprofessional education for graduate adult-gerontology nurse practitioner programming and is currently collaborating with Xu on an interdisciplinary, university team examining social isolation and loneliness in later life. Daniel also has expertise in the use of technology to improve well-being and quality of life in older adults.

Cipher is a health outcomes researcher and biostatistician. Her research interests include statistical risk modeling and statistical instruction tools, among others. Her expertise in analysis of large datasets and previous work on more than 20 previous grant projects will bring invaluable insight to this study.

The team hopes the use of reminiscence combined with an intergeneration approach and digital storytelling in this study will help promote improved social and emotional well-being of older adults, which may help strengthen and/or build resilience of older adults with ADRD.

The project is expected to be completed by the end of 2022.