Soothing dementia carers: a pilot evaluation of an imagery-based wellbeing app feature to support family carers of people with dementia during the COVID-19 pandemic

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has presented unprecedented risks to the health of people living with dementia. Confinement to their homes and extra pressure on the health and social care system, left people with dementia and their carers with reduced access to care services. Accordingly, family carers assumed more caring responsibilities and faced a greater risk of social isolation and loneliness, negatively affecting their mental wellbeing. In response, we developed a new imagery-based feature called Project Soothe within an existing app, CogniCare, which aimed to support the wellbeing of family carers looking after someone with dementia at home. Methods: This new feature aimed to test the utility of our previous research which has shown that viewing soothing images has positive mood benefits on users. In this pilot, we examined the usage of the Project Soothe feature over a one-year period. Results: Our results indicate the feasibility of the imagery-based app feature as we found that most users found viewing the soothing images to have a positive influence on their mood. Conclusions: This finding illustrates feasibility of this imagery-based wellbeing app in this population of interest, and suggests that, upon further replication and research, the Project Soothe feature within the CogniCare app has potential to be developed as a digital wellbeing tool for family carers of people with dementia

Project Soothe: A pilot study evaluating the mood effects of soothing images collected using a citizen science approach

Background: Mentally-generated soothing imagery is a therapeutic technique to support mental wellbeing, but some individuals may require support using externally presented stimuli. Project Soothe was launched to collect soothing images using a citizen science approach. This online pilot study evaluated the first 575 soothing images collected, examining: 1) if the images were perceived to be soothing; 2) if viewing the images had a positive impact on mood; and 3) if mood effects were influenced by individual differences in age, gender and depressive symptoms. Methods: We recruited 1152 participants (13 – 79 years, M = 35.62, SD = 14.60; 77% female). Participants were randomly allocated to one of 23 sets, each containing 25 images (n = 50 per set) and asked to rate their emotional response (soothed, excited, and anxious) to each image. Participants also reported their mood states pre- and post-viewing the images (using the International Positive and Negative Affect Schedule – Short Form). Results: Project Soothe images were rated to be significantly more soothing than anxiety- or excitement-inducing. Further, viewing 25 images was significantly associated with an increase in positive affect and decrease in negative affect. These effects were associated with age and depressive symptoms, with older individuals and those with lower depressive symptoms being associated with more positive changes in mood. Conclusions: This pilot study provides preliminary evidence that these soothing images can promote positive mood changes. Further work can now replicate these findings in larger-scale studies with comparison groups and extended outcome variables. The images and associated data have been made available in a data repository (OSF) as a free resource for researchers and practitioners. It is hoped that these images can be developed into useful therapeutic resources

The Hong Kong Early Child Development Scale-3: a validation study

The Hong Kong Early Child Development Scale (HKECDS) is a tool for assessing holistic early child development in preschoolers aged from three to six years. The original version of the scale, HKECDS, was updated in 2019 (HKECDS-2) to reflect the contemporary context and local curricular expectations. Children (n = 144) from three kindergartens in Hong Kong completed the HKECDS-2 in individual sessions. Rasch model analysis and expert discussions resulted in a short version of the scale (HKECDS-3) with 50 items in nine domains. The domains are Personal and self-care (4 items), Language development (7 items), Pre-academic learning (10 items), Cognitive development (6 items), Gross motor (4 items), Fine motor (2 items), Health and safety (5 items), Moral development (6 items), and Society and environment (6 items). There were significant correlations between findings from the updated version of the tool, HKECDS-3 and the HKECDS-2 (long form), and older children had significantly higher scores than younger children