A Social Engaging Restorative Virtual Environment (SERVE) Volunteer Intervention to Support Social Engagement and Well-Being in Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment

社交参与恢复性虚拟环境 (SERVE) 志愿者干预，支持患有认知障碍的老年人的社交参与和福祉

• 批准号: 10722737
• 负责人: Walter Richard Boot
• 金额: $ 75.55万
• 依托单位: CORNELL UNIVERSITY
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-09-01 至 2028-05-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10722737
• 关键词: Address; Adult; Age; Aging; Alzheimer' s disease related dementia; Ambulatory Care; Behavior Therapy; Cognition; Cognitive; Collaborations; Communities; Control Groups; Data; Dementia; Development; Elderly; Empirical Research; Equilibrium; Family; Focus Groups; Gait; Generations; Goals; Health Expenditures; Health system; Home; Impaired cognition; Individual; Intervention; Intervention Studies; Life; Literature; Loneliness; Mediating; Methods; Onset of illness; Participant; Personal Satisfaction; Persons; Population; Procedures; Productivity; Quality of life; Randomized, Controlled Trials; Research; Social Interaction; Social isolation; Social support; Technology; Testing; Theoretical model; Training; Treatment Efficacy; Videoconferencing; Work; cognitive process; cost effective; design; economic cost; effective therapy; efficacious intervention; efficacy evaluation; experience; high risk; human capital; improved; innovation; iterative design; learning materials; mild cognitive impairment; portability; programs; remote interaction; skills; social; social engagement; societal costs; success; therapy development; usability; user centered design; virtual; virtual environment; virtual reality; virtual reality environment; virtual reality intervention; volunteer

Project Summary With increasing age comes age-associated declines in cognitive and everyday functioning, a greater propensity for illness, and the onset of disorders such as mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and Alzheimer’s Disease Related Dementias (ADRD). People with MCI are at a high risk for developing dementia and thus interventions are needed to improve or maintain current levels of function or delay further cognitive decline, as well as to improve the quality of life among those with MCI. VR-based approaches are portable, adaptable, and cost-effective, which offers enhanced access compared to outpatient treatments. In addition to demonstrating efficacy, another crucial goal of intervention research is developing an understanding of “how and why” interventions work. Insufficient understanding of the underlying principles or the mechanisms of action of interventions impedes implementation. As such, the goal of the proposed work is to generate and test a VR- based intervention to improve the wellbeing and quality of life of older adults with MCI while simultaneously untangling the intervention’s hypothesized mechanisms of action and moderators of intervention success. This project is highly innovative as it is using a VR-based delivery method and harnesses the human capital of older individuals seeking volunteer experiences to engage in meaningful social and cognitive engagement with other older adults with MCI as intervention partners. The inclusion of volunteers will also provide meaningful experiences for the volunteers and enhance the scalability of the intervention. The activities of this Stage I behavioral intervention project will include the generation of a new VR intervention (through the refinement of VR modules that we have already developed along with the creation of new modules), the development of instructional materials to train community interventionists (older adult volunteers), and the preliminary testing of intervention efficacy. The intervention development will apply a user-centered iterative design approach to generate and evaluate the Social Engaging Restorative Virtual Environment (SERVE), which will provide older adults with MCI an opportunity for social interaction through a variety of social and cognitively engaging collaborative activities within their own homes. The intervention will pair MCI individuals with non-impaired older adult volunteers. MCI participants and volunteers will interact remotely within a shared virtual space and productively engage and collaborate in shared activities. We hypothesize, based on empirical research and theoretical models of aging, that SERVE will increase perceived social support among the older adult participants with MCI, and that increases in perceived social support will reduce loneliness, improve wellbeing, and enhance quality of life. Our pilot data and a growing body of research literature suggest that perceived spatial presence within the VR environment will be an important moderator of intervention success.

项目摘要 随着年龄的增长，年龄相关的认知和每天起作用都会下降，更大 疾病的倾向，以及轻度认知障碍（MCI）和阿尔茨海默氏症等疾病的发作 疾病相关痴呆症（ADRD）。 MCI患者患痴呆症的风险很高，因此 需要采取干预措施以提高或维持当前功能水平或延迟进一步的认知下降，因为 以改善MCI患者的生活质量。基于VR的方法是便携式，适应性的，并且 具有成本效益，与门诊治疗相比，它提供了增强的通道。除了演示 疗效，干预研究的另一个关键目标是对“如何以及为什么”的理解发展 干预措施有效。对基本原则或行动机制的理解不足 干预措施阻碍了实施。因此，提议的工作的目的是生成和测试VR- 基于MCI的老年人的福祉和生活质量的基于干预措施，同时 解开干预措施假设的作用机制和干预成功的主持人。这 项目具有高度创新性，因为它使用基于VR的交付方法并利用年龄较大的人力资本 寻求志愿经验的个人与其他人参与有意义的社会和认知参与 具有MCI的老年人为干预伙伴。志愿者的包括也将提供有意义的 志愿者的经验并增强干预的可扩展性。我这个阶段的活动 行为干预项目将包括生成新的VR干预措施（通过完善 我们已经开发的VR模块以及创建新模块） 培训社区干预主义者（老年人志愿者）的教学材料，并进行初步测试 干预效率。干预开发将采用以用户为中心的迭代设计方法 生成和评估社会引人入胜的修复虚拟环境（服务），这将为较旧 MCI的成年人通过各种社交和认知吸引人的社交互动机会 自己家中的协作活动。干预将使MCI个体与未受损 老年人志愿者。 MCI参与者和志愿者将在共享的虚拟空间中进行远程交互，并且 有效地参与共享活动。我们根据实证研究和 衰老的理论模型将增加老年人的感知社会支持 拥有MCI的参与者，而感知到的社会支持的增加将减少孤独感，改善幸福感， 并提高生活质量。我们的飞行员数据和越来越多的研究文献表明 VR环境中的空间存在将是干预成功的重要主持人。