1. Influence of Audio and Visual Stimuli on Stroke Recovery in the Aging Population
Matthew Nare
California State University, Long Beach
Introduction
Pre-Test Mean Completion Times
Procedures
Participants listening to music performed better on memory, cognition, and attention testing compared to participants listening to audio books or participants not listening to anything (Särkämö et al., 2008).
People 65 years or older were studied for the comparison of incidence and mortality for countries around the world (Thrift, Cadilhac, Thayabaranathan, Howard, Howard, et al., 2014).
This research compares the effects auditory and visual stimuli on the participants’ ability to follow verbal instructions on a cognitive task as demonstrated by the completion of the tower of Hanoi.
Participants were equally separated into 2 conditions based on affected hemisphere and sex.
Condition A = auditory only condition (music, (n=30)
Condition B = audio and visual condition (television, n=30)
Both conditions complete a timed pre-test and post-test attempting to complete a 5-ring Tower of Hanoi.
Participants allowed two hours of their group’s stimulation separated into one hour in the morning and one hour in the afternoon for one week.
Participants unable to complete pre-test will not be allowed to continue participation in the study.
Predicted Results
Hypotheses
Time until successful completion will decrease from pre-test to post-test for all participants.
Participants receiving multimodal stimulation will see greater time decrease compared to participants receiving only auditory stimulation.
Participants will improve in auditory attention and ability to follow verbal instructions.
Hypothesis 1: All participants will see improvement in their ability to follow verbal instructions with exposure to either form of stimuli.
Hypothesis 2: Participants receiving the combination of auditory and visual stimuli will see more improvement in their ability to follow verbal instructions compared to the participants receiving only auditory stimuli.
Alternative hypothesis: Participants receiving only auditory stimuli will see more improvement in their ability to follow verbal instructions compared to the participants receiving auditory and visual stimuli.
Post-Test Mean Completion Times
Discussion
Limitations of the Study
Participants’ selection of music or television
Age of participants
Potential of sensory overstimulation
Increasing our knowledge of the effects of different stimuli will allow us to create better environments that will promote cognitive and motor control recovery as well as speed up recovery time.
Participant Criteria
30 Male and 30 Female (n=60) Post-Stroke Patients
30 Right Hemisphere
30 Left Hemisphere
Age of Patients: ≥65 years
Must be 1-2 weeks post-stroke in either the left or right hemisphere.
Cannot have history of prior strokes or brain damage.
Cannot have uncorrected vision or hearing deficits (eyeglasses and hearing aides are acceptable).
Patients classified as “moderate stroke” by NIHSS (Gajurel, Dhungana, Parajuli, Karn, Rajbhandari, Kafle, & Oli, 2014)
References
Särkämö, T., Tervaniemi, M., Laitinen, S., Forsblom, A., Soinila, S., et al. (2008). Music listening enhances cognitive recovery and mood after middle cerebral artery stroke. Brain, 131(3),
Thrift, A., Cadilhac, D., Thayabaranathan, T., Howard, G., Howard, V., et al. (2014). Global stroke statistics. International Journal of Stroke, 9(1), 6-18.
Gajurel, B. P., Dhungana, K., Parajuli, P., Karn, R., Rajbhandari, R., Kafle, D., & Oli, K. K. (2014). The National Institute of Health Stroke Scale Score and Outcome in Acute Ischemic Stroke. Journal Of Institute Of Medicine, 36(3), 9-13.