New step-by-step recipes that caregivers can personalize for a person with dementia.
The new paper recipe called “Happje” was developed through an iterative design process. Thirteen cycles of building a prototype, evaluating it with the target group and making a redesign were completed. At each iteration, the target group of people with dementia and their caregivers were consulted to ensure that the designed tool matched the needs, values, skills and daily context of the participants [1].
People with dementia may have difficulty planning and sequencing cooking steps, but not necessarily executing them [2]. Yamaguchi et al. [3] found step-by-step guidance useful for improving the performance of people with dementia because it removes the challenges of planning and sequencing steps. Happje implements this approach by offering step-by-step instructions for recipes. Each step lists only one task and indicates how many ingredients are needed and where to add them. Finally, because the language skills of people with dementia can decline over time [4], and understanding written instructions can become challenging, icons have been added to visually represent each tool, action, and ingredient in each step .
Happje is presented on paper (rather than in a digital medium) because all previous iterative paper prototypes were easy to use and not intimidating for the older participants. Happje also presents multiple steps on one page to ensure users can keep an overview of the entire series of tasks. Due to the decline in short-term memory [5], people with dementia may also forget the actions they just performed or the reason they set a timer. That's why Happje includes a magnetic token, which users can use to mark the step they are currently working on and remember which actions they have completed. Healthcare providers can also look at the pawn to track progress.
We have published an article about the effect of Happje, which you can find at: One Step at a Time: Evaluation of a Step-By-Step Recipe Tool Designed for People with Dementia | SpringerLink
Researcher
Yvon Ruitenburg
Ruitenburg Y, Houben M, Brankaert R, Lee M, Pasman G (2023) Happje: Stimulating Collaborative Cooking for People with Dementia. Extended Abstracts of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems April 2023 Article No.: 152. Pages 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1145/3544549.3585653
Houben M, Brankaert R, Kenning G, Bongers I, Eggen B (2022) Designing for everyday sounds at home with people with dementia and their partners. In: CHI conference on human factors in computing systems, New York, NY, USA, April, pp 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3501993
Memory loss and dementia | Alzheimer's Society. https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/about-dementia/sym ptoms-and-diagnosis/symptoms/memory-loss. Accessed 19 May 2022
Yamaguchi T, Foloppe DA, Richard P, Richard E, Allain P (2012) A dual-modal virtual reality kitchen for (Re)learning of everyday cooking activities in Alzheimer's disease. Presence 21(1):43–57. https:// doi.org/10.1162/PRES_a_00080
Dirkse R, Kessels R, Hoogeveen F, van Dixhoorn I (2011) Learned new, done old: about the learning capacity of people with dementia. Bohn Stafleu van Loghum (BSL)
Cummings JL, Houlihan JP, Hill MA (1986) The pattern of reading deterioration in dementia of the Alzheimer type: observations and implications. Brain Lang 29(2):315–323. https://doi.org/10.1016/0093934X(86)90051-9