Support for Reflecting on the Lives of the Elderly Using Life Logs
Mai Sasaki (AY 2019)
Objective: It has been shown that reflecting on the lives of the elderly is effective in improving cognitive function, but at present, effective care prevention methods have not been established for the elderly who are relatively active on their own. In addition, smart devices are expected to be utilized to collect information on daily life, and it has been reported in recent years that elderly people use smartphones as recording devices in place of pedometers and heart rate monitors. Therefore, the two objectives of this study are (1) to support and provide opportunities for the elderly to record and review their own life logs, and (2) to propose and verify a method to promote the maintenance of their living conditions and improvement of their lifestyle through reviewing their own life logs.
Method: Participants were recruited from the same exchange activity groups, and a survey was conducted on 10 elderly people (5 men and 5 women) living in the Tsukuba City area over a 5-month period from July to November. The participants were asked to carry a device every day, collect data on their exercise and location, and look back on their life logs at the end of each day for five months. In addition to this, data was extracted every month, and lifestyle information reports were created and distributed. The participants were asked to read this report, reflect on the events of the past month, and write down their feelings and thoughts about the past records. In addition, at the beginning and end of the survey, a questionnaire asking about the "sense of purpose in life" was administered to measure changes to the mental aspect accompanying the experiment.
Results: The obtained numerical changes were patterned one by one, but no dramatic improvement in living conditions was observed in any of the items. On the other hand, a movement toward reflecting on and improving one's life based on the life log was evident from the descriptions in the questionnaire regarding the report. The question with the highest average number of words in the questionnaire was Q13, which asked respondents to describe how they felt their lives had changed as a result of the survey, followed by Q1, which asked respondents to provide the number of steps they had taken in a month, one day at a time, and to write down what they had noticed. In the questionnaires regarding the sense of purpose in life conducted before and after the survey, changes in the average acquisition scores were either maintained or increased for all items of "pride," "sense of fulfillment," and "motivation to achieve," with no items showing a decrease.
Discussion/Conclusion: Although no dramatic increases or improvements in values were detected, three items were particularly useful in reflecting on the changes in life associated with the survey, the number of steps taken per day, and the outing highlights. Regarding the sense of purpose in life, the average acquisition score increased significantly for the items "There are things I feel only I can do" and "There are things I feel recognized and appreciated by others", which ranked 11th and 8th out of 11 items in the average score. We believe that this may have been due to the "providing an opportunity to summarize and reflect on the records after a certain period of time" part of this study, which may have been effective. In fact, some participants used the monthly reports distributed to them to recall the events of the day in comparison with the data from their own recording devices. For those who were not in the habit of recording, this periodic review may have changed their mentality, giving them a sense of pride and a sense of commitment to their lives. This method was shown to be an effective way to support reflection that can be incorporated into the lifestyle habits of the elderly and to promote lifestyle improvement.
(Translated by DeepL)