A FRAMEWORK FOR INTERACTIVE SYSTEMS TO SUPPORT DEMENTIA CARE VOLUNTEERS

Abstract

Volunteers at long-term care homes often find it difficult to interact with residents who have dementia. With sufficient training, such volunteer-provided interaction can supply much needed engagement activities and social interactions for these residents. However, recent trends of higher volunteer transience and limited caregiver availability threaten the supply of engagement activities to care homes. Existing interactive systems to help dementia caregivers supply engagement have mostly assumed that the operators of such systems are care staff and family. Volunteers are different from such operators, since they do not have the advantage of training and shared background to inform their ability to engage people with dementia. In this thesis, I use Activity Theory to map the needs of volunteers in dementia care, implement an interactive system to address these needs, and evaluate the effectiveness of the system in meeting these goals. The thesis contributes to the literature on dementia care technology by 1) building on dementia care research to include non-kin, non-expert health caregivers, 2) providing a system framework to support such caregivers in a sustainable manner and 3) contributing an interaction artefact in the form of an ecologically viable volunteer support system.