An ad hoc committee will organize a public workshop on research gaps and opportunities for exploring the relationship of the arts to health and well-being in older adults. The presentations and discussions at the workshop will cover the current state of evidence and potential research questions for one or more of the following topics: 
• The relationship of arts programs and interventions to cognitive, sensory, and motor skills function in older adults, and the underlying brain processes; 
• The relationship of aesthetics and design factors to health and quality-of-life-related outcomes of older adults in long-term care and assisted living facilities; 
• Cost-benefit analyses associated with the inclusion of arts programs and interventions in healthcare delivery for older adults; 
• Comparative benefits or weaknesses of arts therapies over other behavioral and/or pharmacological interventions for older adults experiencing declines in cognitive, sensory, and/or motor ability; and 
• The relationship of art-making and creativity to physical health and psychological well-being of older adults.

The committee will plan the workshop agenda, identify authors of commissioned papers on research gaps and opportunities to be presented on each of the topics selected for workshop sessions, identify discussants for each paper and moderate the discussions. A verbatim transcript of the workshop proceedings will be issued. The commissioned papers will also be made available as part of the workshop background materials by posting on the Internet.
 

Sponsors of this project are a consortium of the National Endowment for the Arts and three units within the National Institutes of Health: the National Institute on Aging, the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, and the National Center for Complementary & Alternative Medicine. 

Steering Committee

David Reuben, UCLA (chair)
Sandra Edmonds Crewe, Howard University
Nina Kraus, Northwestern University
Art Kramer, University of Illinois
Becca Levy, Yale University
Helga Noice, Elmhurst College

Workshop

The workshop was presented by the National Academy of Sciences, Committee on National Statistics, at the request of a consortium of the National Endowment for the Arts and three units within the National Institutes of Health: the National Institute on Aging, the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, and the National Center for Complementary & Alternative Medicine. The purpose of the workshop was to identify research gaps and opportunities for exploring the relationship of arts participation and creativity to physical health and psychological well-being in older adults. It provided a critique of the field, including challenges in undertaking research capacity-building; and it offered guidance for the design of future studies and research funding opportunities.

Agenda

Participant Bios

Presentations

(Please note that the presentations included here may be subject to copyright restrictions of the individual presenters.)

Commissioned Papers (papers available at end of September)

Tony Noice, Elmhurst College, Helga Noice, Elmhurst College and Art Kramer, University of Illinois, Participatory Arts: Benefits and Challenges

Nina Kraus and Alexandra Parbery-Clark, Northwestern University, Music and Aging: Exercise for a Well-tempered Mind

Anne Basting, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, and Kate de Medeiros, Miami University, An Overview of Pharmacological and Non-pharmacological Interventions for Older Adults with Cognitive Decline

Thomas Prohaska, George Mason University, and Melissa Castora-Binkley, University of South Florida, Cost and Cost Effectiveness in the Translation from Randomized Controlled Trials to Community Evidence-Based Arts Programs

Kathy Hathorn, American Art Resources, The Role of Art in Improving Quality-of-Life Related Outcomes for Older Adults

Transcript

NOTE: This is an edited verbatim transcript of the workshop Research Gaps and Opportunities for Exploring the Relationship of the Arts to Health and Well-Being in Older Adults held on September 14, 2012, prepared by CASET Associates and is not an official report of National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, or the National Research Council (the “National Academies”). Opinions and statements included in the transcript are solely those of the individual persons or participants at the workshop, and are not necessarily adopted or endorsed or verified as accurate by the National Academies.