Sing from your Seat: community singing in the great outdoors in VR as a beneficial intervention for the elderly

研究项目“山是活的：通过沉浸式技术结合自然环境和集体歌唱的好处”，成功地开发和实施了一种新的沉浸式体验，其中个人在虚拟现实中参加湖区山顶上的集体歌唱活动。该项目与国家信托基金和凯斯威克博物馆的项目合作伙伴一起构思，实现了其核心目标，不仅为身体健全的参与者提供机会，享受在山顶唱歌的多种福利，而且还为那些无法通过沉浸式虚拟现实体验参加此类活动的人提供机会。为此，30名普通市民在凯斯威克博物馆尝试了这一体验;戴上麦克风、VR耳机和耳机，他们可以参加即兴歌唱工作坊，也可以在大山墙顶上唱歌或观看合唱表演。该展览在现场举办了6周，有50多人参观（被动，非身临其境地观察记录的表演）。除了最初项目的目标之外，我们还设计并测试了一个高效的工作流程，用于使用更广泛和更便宜的技术的移动的体验版本。在湖活节150参加了这个“移动的”的经验。所有参与者在尝试了博物馆版和“移动的”版体验后都报告了 * 和 *。这个后续项目通过针对一个全新的社区，为这些先前确定的影响途径增加了重要价值：居住在庇护所或住宅区的老年人。这一人群特别适合直接从这项工作中受益，集体歌唱活动和户外活动在该部门和学术研究中被认为对他们的福祉和生活质量很重要。然而，他们的参与超出了最初项目的范围，因为即使是参观博物馆也不在许多居民的日常能力之内。因此，需要开展一系列独特的新工作，以有意义的方式传播研究项目的成果，最大限度地提高参与度并满足老年社区的特定需求。这项工作将应用研究项目中开发的相关工作流程，并从我们试点的经验中获得的反馈中学习，为老年社区创造一种新的，定制的互动集体歌唱体验。我们将与我们的新合作伙伴，英国，和四个护理院在约克郡，从事有意义的知识交流，他们的专家理解这一新的人口，以设计新的经验与现有的合作伙伴和艺术总监戴夫卡姆林。我们将在四个月的时间里把我们的新经验带到约克的日间中心和护理院，收集参与者和工作人员的反馈。我们将通过一个新的影响测量模型来测量这些公众参与活动的影响，该模型具有不同的度量和描述性理解，包括：尝试，评级和返回体验的个人数量;从员工的角度来看用户的参与度，特别是考虑到他们与居民的关系;以及员工是否愿意/热衷于将体验作为一项重要的干预措施/活动，以改善其居民的生活质量。我们将制定一个新的工作流程，使机构能够将我们的经验融入其活动结构，满足个人的实际需要，包括经济限制、现有的内部技术和技能组合。这些在线内容将使组织能够不受限制地轻松访问我们在不同参与级别的经验，这取决于可用的资源，提供可持续的，有影响力的和引人入胜的体验，并在整个社会中带来潜在的利益。

The research project 'The Hills are Alive: combining the benefits of natural environments and group singing through immersive technologies', successfully developed and implemented a new immersive experience in which individuals participate in a group singing event on a Lake District mountain summit in virtual reality. Conceived with project partners the National Trust and Keswick Museum, this project achieved its core aim to provide opportunities not just for able-bodied participants to enjoy the multiple wellbeing benefits of singing on mountain summits, but also to present opportunities for those otherwise unable to access such activities to do so through an immersive virtual reality experience. To this end, 30 members of the general public tried the experience at Keswick Museum; wearing a microphone, VR headset and headphones, they could participate in an improvised singing workshop, or sing or observe a choral performance on the top of Great Gable. The exhibit which was in situ for 6 weeks was visited by over 50 people (for passive, non-immersive observation of the recorded performances). Beyond the objectives of the original project we devised and tested an efficient workflow for a mobile version of the experience utilising more widely available and cheaper technology. At the Lakes Alive Festival 150 took part in this 'mobile' experience. All participants reported *** and *** after trying both museum and 'mobile' versions of the experience. This follow-on project adds significant value to these previously defined pathways for impact, by targeting an entirely new community: Elderly people living in sheltered or residential accommodation. This demographic are especially suited to benefit directly from this work, with both group singing activities and access to the outdoors acknowledged in the sector and in academic research as being important to their wellbeing and quality of life. However their engagement was beyond the scope of the original project as even a visit to a museum is not within the everyday capabilities of many residents. A distinct new body of work is therefore needed to disseminate the outputs of the research project in a meaningful way that maximises engagement and meets the specific needs of the elderly community. This work will apply the relevant workflows developed in the research project, and learn from the feedback received from the experiences we piloted, to create a new, bespoke interactive group singing experience for the elderly community. We will work closely with our new partners, AgeUK, and four care homes in Yorkshire, to engage in meaningful knowledge exchange of their expert understanding of this new demographic to devise the new experience with existing partner and artistic director Dave Camlin. We will take our new experience to day centres and care homes in York over a four month period, gathering feedback from participants and staff. We will measure the impact of these public engagement activities through a new model of impact measurement, with different levels of metrics and descriptive understanding, including; the number of individuals trying, rating and returning to the experience; the engagement of users from the perspective of staff, especially considering their relationship with the residents; and, the willingness / enthusiasm of staff to implement the experience as an important intervention / activity to improve the quality of life of their residents.A new workflow will be developed to enable organisations to integrate our experiences into their activity structures, catering for individual practical requirements, including economic constraints, available in-house technologies and skills sets. This online content will enable organisations unrestricted and easy access to our experience at different levels of participation depending on the resources available, providing a sustainable, impactful and engaging experience with potential benefits across society.