Brain training for the elderly better on paper or on the computer?

I'm going to re-direct you here to another blog, which is based on the paper: Brain Training for Silver Gamers: Effects of Age and Game Form on Effectiveness, Efficiency, Self-Assessment, and Gameplay Experience Cyberpsychology &behaviour.

I'm trying to locate the paper and have found the journal, but don't seem to find the actual paper. If one of you could help me. Thanks!

Internet access August report (Office for National Statistics)

My summary

2009 National Statistics Opinions (Omnibus) survey

• 18.31 million (70%) UK households had Internet access
• Of those households with Internet access, 90 percent had a broadband connection in 2009, an increase from 69 per cent in 2006.
• The number of adults who had never accessed the Internet fell to 10.2 million adults (21 per cent) in 2009
• The largest increase in the proportion of those accessing the Internet was in the oldest age group (65plus) 15%, compared with 3 % for the 16-24 age group
• 52 % of the age group 65plus are using the Internet every day or almost every day
• 2009 shows a boom in social networking: newsgroups, chat, posting message or self-created content
• An increase from 24 % to 40 % of recent Internet users who uploaded self-created content
• 42% of recent users listen to web radio or watching web television
• The most popular purchase for the oldest age group were books, magazines newspapers or e-learning material

Download full report

Likeability

Searching for something else in the ACM Digital Library my eye was caught by the word likeability, which we have discussed often. A 2008 paper by Sutcliffe and Namoune Getting the message across: visual attention, aesthetic design and what users remember relates likeability to other aspects.

Narrative in-depth research

There’s an obituary in today’s Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/sep/23/dennis-marsden-obituary which has a tangential relevance to our project. Marsden seems to have been a pioneer of the discursive interview process in the social sciences. There is often a tension between breadth and depth in research and Marsden might make an interesting argument for the value of the depth-based approach.
  

3 interesting articles - all to do with the brain

Gordon and Stephen pointed 3 articles out to me. For reasons of completeness I'm adding them to the blog.

Can a daily pill really boost your brain power? - Observer 20th Sept
Read article

Twitter, YouTube damage working memory - ITpro 7th Sept
Read article

How to boost your brain power - The Guardian 21st Sept
Read article

The Reminiscene bump

I only learnt recently through Sarah Reed (Contact-the-Elderly trustee and runs her business with the memory cards) about the reminiscence bump.

Wiki definition:
"The reminiscence bump is the effect in the temporal distribution of autobiographical memory revealed in research by David Rubin and others that people tend to recall more personal events from adolescence and early adulthood (10-25 years) than personal events from other lifetime periods."


Recently she published an interesting blog Leeds univeristy research and how people remember the Beatles.
have a read.

Chat with Patricia Wright - care home manager where Ivy the 104 year old twitterer lives

I gave the Hillside Manor Care home a call to find out if there were anymore care homes in London who are similarly proactive about getting their residents involved in online activities.

I spoke to Patricia Wright who is the care home manager. She appears to be a very passionate woman who loves her work. She joined the care home 7 years ago and turned lots of things around.
"7 years ago they were just sitting there and watching TV" Patricia explained. She had to motivate staff that things can be different and also the residents because they didn't know that it could be any different. (This reminded me a bit of ‘learnt helplessness’) She started a series of activities such as culture nights, exercise classes, scrabble nights, news paper discussion, a beautician coming in, the over 75years Olympics and more.

She introduced the computer to have more options to do for the residents. Patricia's view was: "I don't see any reason why they can’t use computers". The care home currently has 1 laptop and staff and residents share it. Ivy loves Facebook and Twitter. Another woman likes looking at the website for the Vatican. Another man who goes to his photography class uses the computer to upload his photos and other person just enjoy playing games on it. Some of the residents (e.g. Ivy) can use the computer by themselves, but there is always a member of staff nearby who can come and help when they get stuck.

Patricia explains how the care home would need 3 laptops, so more residents can join in.
According to Patricia it must be harder for older people who live by themselves to use a computer because the fear factor ("I have broken something") would be greater. The care home with staff is a safe place in that respect.

The Manor Hill care home is partly private, partly DSS funded. They have 19 residents and 17 staff of which 4 /5 people are always on shift. Patricia has so many staff because she runs a training program for carers sponsored by Help the Aged.
She also said she couldn't do all these things (Olympics etc.) if she hadn't got this highly motivated team of staff.

The telephone interview took place on 11.09.09 between 12:00 - 12:30pm. I would like to thank Patricia Wright for all the information provided.

Learn about the oldest twitter user

Watch the CNN video of 104 year old Ivy Bean

Watch the video