What is it about?
The article is really a 'think piece' designed to encourage people to explore the possibilities of gaming as a way of delivering the therapeutic and measurable benefits of music to those suffering from Dementia. Outcomes from work of this sort would also be of relevance more widely within the community.
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Why is it important?
Recent years have witnessed a growing awareness of the challenges of Dementia for sufferers and carers. The need for research to find potential ways of treating or delaying the onset of the disease is growing. While research is ongoing to find treatments, if not cures, there is a growing body of scientific data revealing the potential of music and music therapy to deliver very real benefits to sufferers of Dementia. Given the popularity of gaming, there has never been a better time to explore the health benefits of therapeutic gaming within the context of Dementia care.
Perspectives
I remember seeing a clip from the film 'Alive Inside' on Utube (2014, Director Michael Rossato-Bennett) showing a man called Henry suffering from advanced Dementia - he appeared unresponsive until he listened to his favourite music, at which point he became quite enlivened and his memory appeared to become temporarily unlocked. He was listening to a simple media player with a playlist of his favourite music. I was working on another paper at the time exploring the challenges of biometric gaming (using sensors to measure physiological responses as a means of triggering game audio changes) and wondered whether technologies such as this might not be used as a means of delivering more targeted music therapy treatments to sufferers of dementia - even in the closing stages of the disease. Although the challenges of such work would be significant, the potential benefits might be considerable.
Ms Helen R Mitchell
University of Hull
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Dementia, Music and Biometric Gaming: Rising to the Dementia Challenge, Leonardo Music Journal, December 2015, The MIT Press,
DOI: 10.1162/lmj_a_00928.
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