Music

In the lecture, the potential effectiveness of music was discussed. Music cognition investigates human musical response and behavior and involves many different functional domains. Therefore, music has a great potential to activate and engage. Moreover, it was mentioned that music is used as a mood-modulator in non-clinical everyday settings. Music could arouse multisensory stimulation which has beneficial effects. Because of the great potential of music for social interaction, communication, or as a joint activity, it can also be used by Pepper to make our robot prototype more functional and powerful.

We plan to use music for four main purposes:

1. Make the PwD aware of Pepper's presence.
   Before each activity or reminder, Pepper would play a piece of short music to indicate its location to the PwD and catch their attention.
2. Use music to create associations to certain tasks for the PwD.
   We added a short piece of music before each activity. We are using the same music for all activities now, but we could also set different music for different activities. In this way, PwDs could build associations with certain activities. Whenever a piece of specific music is played, the PwD would know which activity they are going to do. Researchers have shown that the use of music is a means of elevating sub-maximal exercise intensity, manipulating effort sense, improving in-task affect, and inducing positive attitudes towards the exercise experience [1]. In practice, the results of this study indicate that music may be beneficial to exercises involved in cardio-respiratory fitness regimes. Therefore, we use music as a tool to help the PwD perform better in activities.
3. Relax the PwD.
   Music can help people to relax. It is easy to startle the PwD if Pepper suddenly starts to talk without any prior warning. Therefore, Pepper plays gentle music to relax the PwD. As the PwD becomes aware of Pepper's presence and expects an interaction, they are less likely to get startled. Researchers found that state anxiety, heart rate, and respiratory rate all decreased significantly for those subjects who received a single treatment of music [2]. These findings indicate that music therapy indeed was effective in reducing the pressure and helping people to relax.
4. Entertain the PwD.
   People are often happy if they listen to some music they like. In our current prototype, we are using the same music for all the activities. But we can customize it according to different activities and to the preferences of the different patients. As the music is customized for a specific person, it gives greater chances of success.

Cognition

In the lecture, neural changes and cognitive changes in the brain of older people and people with dementia were discussed. The brain of older people suffers from both structural and functional changes, like cortical thinning/atrophy, decrease in cerebral blood flow, degradation of cells, etc. Things get worse for people with dementia. Therefore, we want to prevent the damage by some interventions. The goals are to prevent “excess disability”, promote functional improvement, and maintain QoL for both the patient and their family.

In the paper, Cognitive stimulation for dementia: A systematic review of the evidence of effectiveness from randomised controlled trials, researchers found that cognitive stimulation consistently improves cognitive function in people with dementia [3]. It also indicates that cognitive stimulation also benefits self-reported well-being and quality of life. 

In our design, we took activity breakdown as cognitive stimulation. Activities that the PwD enjoys would be added to Pepper. Then Pepper can guide the PwD through the whole process step by step. In this way, PwDs would feel that they still can do something and also stimulate their cognitive ability.

[1] Elliott, D., Carr, S., & Orme, D. (2005). The effect of motivational music on sub-maximal exercise. European journal of sport science, 5(2), 97-106. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17461390500171310?casa_token=8lmWvXDz4NcAAAAA%3A28VNcoliszyW7baZ92sgGSfVd415_fG96tttO6TEb7Gys28hQ90H9aNNJezCEBjVnnVqNaiZMNwmNg
[2] Chlan, L. (1998). Effectiveness of a music therapy intervention on relaxation and anxiety for patients receiving ventilatory assistance. Heart & Lung, 27(3), 169-176. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0147956398900048
[3] Aguirre, E., Woods, R. T., Spector, A., & Orrell, M. (2013). Cognitive stimulation for dementia: a systematic review of the evidence of effectiveness from randomised controlled trials. Ageing research reviews, 12(1), 253-262. https://www-sciencedirect-com.tudelft.idm.oclc.org/science/article/pii/S1568163712000955?casa_token=w_q3pZzmseAAAAAA:vclGWiDLjDL47H_yEo5DQSpTUqptn2gRsp3Mmg1YbtfJdF6VjyoByCZm8CapIdFbnf-VcRY7xSg