Care staff perspectives of clinically meaningful outcomes of supportive care programs for persons with dementia in Kentucky: A qualitative multiple case study.

Background: Emerging research suggests that complementary and supportive care programs, such as music therapy, show positive short‐term impacts (e.g., purposeful engagement, positive emotions) on persons with dementia who live in care facilities.

Strategies to enhance treatment fidelity and music-based intervention reporting in dementia research.

Creative solutions are needed to address the well-being of the growing number of individuals living with dementia. Music-based interventions (MBIs) are promising and can be cost-effective; however, empirical evidence for MBIs is limited and published findings have not been widely translated into practice. Here, we describe how we implemented strategies to enhance rigor in a randomized clinical trial of an MBI for persons with dementia.

Music-Evoked Autobiographical Memories are Associated with Negative Affect in Younger and Older Adults.

Background: Music evokes strong and persistent emotional responses. However, the mechanisms underlying the emotional effects of music, particularly in older adults, are largely unknown. One purported mechanism by which music evokes emotions is through memory - that is, music evokes personal, autobiographical memories that then lead to emotional responses.

Music Therapy Increases Social and Emotional Well-Being in Persons With Dementia: A Randomized Clinical Crossover Trial Comparing Singing to Verbal Discussion.

The number of people living with Alzheimer's disease and related dementias (ADRD) is growing proportional to our aging population. Although music-based interventions may offer meaningful support to these individuals, most music therapy research lacks well-matched comparison conditions and specific intervention focus, which limits evaluation of intervention effectiveness and possible mechanisms. Here, we report a randomized clinical crossover trial in which we examined the impact of a singing-based music therapy intervention on feelings, emotions, and social engagement in 32 care facility residents with ADRD (aged 65-97 years), relative to an analogous nonmusic condition (verbal discussion).

Hooked on a Feeling: Influence of Brief Exposure to Familiar Music on Feelings of Emotion in Individuals with Alzheimer's Disease.

Background: Research has indicated that individuals with Alzheimer's-type dementia (AD) can experience prolonged emotions, even when they cannot recall the eliciting event. Less is known about whether music can modify the emotional state of individuals with AD and whether emotions evoked by music linger in the absence of a declarative memory for the eliciting event.

Objective: We examined the effects of participant-selected recorded music on self-reported feelings of emotion in individuals with AD, and whether these feelings persisted irrespective of declarative memory for the emotion-inducing stimuli.

Sex and stress: Men and women show different cortisol responses to psychological stress induced by the Trier social stress test and the Iowa singing social stress test.

Acute psychological stress affects each of us in our daily lives and is increasingly a topic of discussion for its role in mental illness, aging, cognition, and overall health. A better understanding of how such stress affects the body and mind could contribute to the development of more effective clinical interventions and prevention practices. Over the past 3 decades, the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) has been widely used to induce acute stress in a laboratory setting based on the principles of social evaluative threat, namely, a judged speech-making task.

Paula Lind Ayers: "song-physician" for troops with shell shock during World War I.

Background: Little is known about the therapeutic uses of music during the First World War. This historical study provides a biography of Paula Lind Ayers (1891-1974), a vocalist, actress, and YMCA Entertainer who became known as "the girl who could sing away shell shock."

Objective: The purpose of this study is to describe Paula Lind Ayers' respite services during World War I and provide a contextual biography of her life.

History of music therapy treatment interventions for children with autism.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic review of the history of music therapy research and treatment of children with autism. Understanding such history is important in order to improve clinical efficacy and inform future research. This paper includes a history of autism diagnosis, reviews strengths and limitations of music therapy practice with children with autism from 1940-2009, and suggests direction for future music therapy research and clinical practice with this population.