{"id":101,"date":"2018-12-17T09:38:42","date_gmt":"2018-12-17T09:38:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/?p=101"},"modified":"2019-05-08T21:37:41","modified_gmt":"2019-05-08T20:37:41","slug":"nostalgia-aint-what-it-used-to-be-or-is-it-exploring-the-psychological-benefits-of-nostalgia-for-people-with-dementia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/nostalgia-aint-what-it-used-to-be-or-is-it-exploring-the-psychological-benefits-of-nostalgia-for-people-with-dementia\/","title":{"rendered":"Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be… or is it? Exploring the psychological benefits of nostalgia for people with dementia"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Gary Christopher<\/a><\/h1>\n

In this blog, I shall talk a little about my research on nostalgia<\/a>, and in particular how it relates to dementia.\u00a0 I am interested in exploring the power of nostalgic recall on a person’s sense of self and well-being.<\/p>\n

Dementia is forever in the news.\u00a0 It is now seen as being the most feared of all conditions.\u00a0 It is generally thought to be intrinsically linked to old age, and it is true that age is the biggest factor associated with various dementias, but it is important to be aware that it can affect people relatively early on.\u00a0 Dementia is an umbrella term for a range of conditions, the most common of which is Alzheimer\u2019s disease.\u00a0 Dementias start off by causing very specific problems in cognitive functioning but, with time, decline is global, impacting on all areas of a person\u2019s life.\u00a0 Rate of deterioration varies but, in all cases, progression is unceasing.\u00a0 There is also no known cure at this stage for dementia.<\/p>\n

The sheer terror of the word \u2018dementia\u2019 sets off a cascade of mental and physiological responses, all of which, if not carefully managed, could quickly spiral out of control.\u00a0 Our wider research programme is concerned with helping people confront the existential threat of dementia<\/a> while at the same time better managing the associated feelings.<\/p>\n

Back to nostalgia.\u00a0 It is worthwhile exploring what I refer to when using this term.\u00a0 Before doing so, let’s consider what people generally understand it to mean.\u00a0 Nostalgia as a concept seems to crop up in many places.\u00a0 In fact, it might be seen as being the new buzzword.\u00a0 For my colleagues and me, this is unfortunate as the true meaning of ‘nostalgia’, or more accurately ‘nostalgic recall’, is very specific and has powerful psychological effects.<\/p>\n

Again, I digress.\u00a0 So, nostalgia.\u00a0 What is?<\/p>\n

The origins of the word ‘nostalgia’ bear little resemblance to the common interpretation of the word.\u00a0 It derived from two Greek words, nostos (return home) and algos (pain), and was first coined in the 17th Century to describe soldiers\u2019 poor state of mind during the time of war where many experienced an overwhelming longing to return to their homeland.\u00a0 Initially, it was looked upon as a somewhat negative state to find oneself in.\u00a0 Now, nostalgia is getting better press.\u00a0 So much so that, as one leading expert describes it, nostalgia is “absolutely central to human experience<\/a>“.\u00a0 That quote was by Constantine Sedikides, to whom I shall return very soon.<\/p>\n

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When you ask for synonyms of ‘nostalgia’ in your preferred search engine,\u00a0 you see listed terms such as wistfulness, longing, regret, reminiscence, and sentimentality.\u00a0 The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as, “Sentimental longing for… the past.”\u00a0 A nostalgic memory is something that is meaningful and generally positive.\u00a0 It is a specific memory of an occasion that holds high personal value.\u00a0 It is a memory that can be brought vividly back to one’s mind by a particular trigger.\u00a0 This could be a certain smell, taste, location, or myriad other forms of stimuli.<\/p>\n

There is another component to this definition that I left out, where nostalgia also describes a “regretful memory of a period of the past”.<\/p>\n

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There is a sense, then, that nostalgic memories can be bittersweet in nature.\u00a0 The memory you bring to mind is powerful, full of positive emotions, but there might also be a sense of dismay or sorrow that you are recalling a memory of a time that is now past, reflecting a life once lived.\u00a0 However, a characteristic of nostalgic memories is that, although there may be an initial sadness evoked by it, positive emotions associated with the event win through in the end leaving the person feeling strengthened.<\/p>\n

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Credit: MusicOomph.com<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One particular nostalgic memory for me is triggered by hearing Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade.\u00a0 This piece of music immediately unleashes a clear sense of being at an open-air concert listening to a world-class orchestra.\u00a0 It was a beautiful evening.\u00a0 The sun was setting.\u00a0 Peacocks were peacocking (or whatever the word is for the noise they make).\u00a0 All was sublime.\u00a0 The bittersweet element comes into play as I was there on my own, with no one at that time to share the moment with.\u00a0 With that, there is a tinge of sadness, but the beauty and power of the moment soon leaves me feeling all is right with the world.\u00a0 It was a true Morse moment.<\/p>\n

A great deal of work has been carried out within social psychology exploring the benefits of nostalgia.\u00a0 The leading experts in this field are Professors Constantine Sedikides and Tim Wildschut at the University of Southampton. Throughout their career, they have amassed a vast body of experimental evidence to back up their claims that nostalgic recall boosts a range of psychological resources.\u00a0 They have shown that nostalgic recall strengthens a person’s belief in themselves.\u00a0 It makes them feel as if they are the same person they have always been.\u00a0 It increases their sense of connection to other people.\u00a0 Also, after recalling a nostalgic memory, people feel more optimistic and experience a greater sense that their life has meaning.<\/p>\n

The research on nostalgia that I will be talking about here is a collaboration with Professor Rik Cheston, Emily Dodd, and Dr Sanda Ismail at UWE Bristol.\u00a0 This work developed out of an existing collaboration we had with Constantine and Tim where we had been working on exploring how memory often functions to protect us by filtering out information that we might find threatening<\/a>.\u00a0 We were interested in seeing if we could show the same effect in people with dementia that they found among healthy adults.\u00a0\u00a0 I am happy to report that we did.\u00a0 Regarding nostalgia, again we wanted to see if we could obtain the same effects in people with dementia.<\/p>\n

Our work on nostalgia started with Sanda who was a PhD student at the time.\u00a0 He began by conducting a systematic review of the relevant literature<\/a>.\u00a0 Given that ours is the first series of studies to examine nostalgia in dementia, he focused on reviewing the literature looking at the impact of nostalgia on well-being.\u00a0 Reminiscence therapy is concerned with discussing the past.\u00a0 There was little evidence to suggest reminiscence therapy is effective<\/a>.\u00a0 That is not to say it does no good, it just means that, when looking across a range of studies, the overall statistical effect is weak.\u00a0 Reminiscence therapy appears to have an impact on people’s lives.\u00a0 However, we argue that any positive results are due to people recalling nostalgic memories, and so it is this component that we need to emphasise in order to maximise benefits to the individual.\u00a0 I shall come back to this shortly when I talk about the intervention we are developing.<\/p>\n

We ran a series of experiments where we induced nostalgia.\u00a0 In one experiment, we looked at the impact of a nostalgic piece of music on a person’s mood and outlook.\u00a0 In all cases, we found the positive effects of nostalgia<\/a> that we talked about earlier, but this time in a group of people who had been diagnosed with dementia.<\/p>\n

We are continuing to explore the benefits of nostalgic recall in dementia.\u00a0 We are seeing that nostalgia helps people deal with any disconnect between their current experience and what happened in the past.\u00a0 One of the things to develop from this work is a new intervention.\u00a0 Indeed, we are currently trialling a nostalgia-based therapy explicitly aimed at people with dementia.\u00a0 It explicitly asks people to bring to mind the highly nostalgic memories I talked about earlier.<\/p>\n

The findings so far are encouraging.\u00a0 When developing any intervention, there are some practical issues to take into account.\u00a0 Will people be able to fit it into their daily routine?\u00a0 Will it take up too much of their time?\u00a0 Will they lose interest?\u00a0 This is before we can consider whether it has any beneficial effect or not.\u00a0 We also need to assess if there are any negative implications for this form of intervention.\u00a0 So far the feedback has been positive.\u00a0 Both the person with dementia and their carer\/spouse have been able to find times throughout the week to actively engage in nostalgic recall, and the effect has been beneficial for both parties.<\/p>\n

An essential part of any intervention, especially one aimed at improving quality of life, is to obtain feedback from those you are trying to help.\u00a0 For this intervention, both the person with dementia and their carer play a pivotal role in helping us modify the procedure so that it will be more acceptable and useful.\u00a0 This careful, iterative process will enable us to have more confidence that the intervention we offer will have substantial practical benefits for all concerned.\u00a0 Once revised, we will conduct a larger trial to assess its impact on a broader range of people and settings.<\/p>\n

I started this blog by reflecting on how the word nostalgia has been adopted into everyday language, and as a result, its true meaning has been lost.\u00a0 It is important to remember these words were around long before people like us decided to give them specific psychology-related definitions.\u00a0 What we are arguing is that, when it comes to the therapeutic use of nostalgia, we need to be explicit what we mean.\u00a0 The reason why we need to be precise is that we believe it will improve a range of key psychological resources.<\/p>\n

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Nostalgic recall is something we can all do.\u00a0 It does not require a massive amount of time or effort.\u00a0 In fact, a few minutes, listening to a particular piece of music, contemplating a photograph, bringing to mind a profoundly personal memory that the sound or the image instils, will make us feel better.\u00a0 It will enable us to better deal with what life throws at us, especially at times when we feel threatened.\u00a0 In the case of people with dementia, nostalgic recall is something that can be carried out on one’s own, or with a loved one.\u00a0 After all, believing in oneself, knowing we are the same person regardless of our health, being surrounded by people we care about, feeling optimistic, and knowing our life has meaning is central to living well with dementia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Gary Christopher In this blog, I shall talk a little about my research on nostalgia, and in particular how it relates to dementia.\u00a0 I am interested in exploring the power of nostalgic recall on a person’s sense of self and well-being. Dementia is forever in the news.\u00a0 It is now seen as being the … Continue reading “Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be… or is it? Exploring the psychological benefits of nostalgia for people with dementia”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":106,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[24,23,25,22,9,8],"class_list":["post-101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-ageing","tag-dementia","tag-music","tag-nostalgia","tag-psychology","tag-research"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":189,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions\/189"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/psychological-sciences\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}