ProVACAT: Practising or viewing art cognitive ability trial: A collaboration between the Ben Uri Gallery and Museum and Hammerson House Care Home (2015/16)

Abstract

Art Engagement to Slow Cognitive Impairment and Improve Wellbeing. As the UK National Health Service strives to support an ageing population with increased life expectancy we see a rise in social prescribing. Our ambition is to conduct a randomised, long-term intervention assessing the potential for arts engagement to slow expected cognitive decline and improve wellbeing. We identified a residential care home with the appropriate facilities and support for a feasibility study. Our intervention sees Group A receive practical art sessions exploring new materials and techniques. Group B receive seminars responding to replica artworks with open discussion. Participant wellbeing was measured immediately following each session using the UCL Museum Wellbeing Measures Toolkit. Over twelve weeks, two groups of four participants, each with an average age of 93 attended one hour creative sessions and seminars respectively. The results demonstrate a positive variability of outcomes with different wellbeing responses between the two groups at this early stage. They mark the potential for more ambitious projects, addressing a larger group of participants with greater measurement of cognitive function under a randomised controlled trial. The project seeks to achieve a generalisablity applicable to varying demographics.