“I can’t remember what I’ve seen today. I can’t really remember where I was and what was happening. It’s really hard to keep things together. Sometimes I’m losing this idea of who I am, you know? I mean, I have it somewhere but sometimes it’s just hard to figure. It’s frustrating”.
“If you close your eyes, turn your head left or right, up or down, then, saying click, open and close your eyes very quickly, you will experience the photographic moment. It’s like that inside a camera when the shutter clicks. And that makes you turn and say: ‘hey, did you see that?’ ”.
The first quote belongs to Martin, he is 76 and he has lived with dementia for more than twelve years. He is aware of the changes in his life and is still both able to articulate this, and importantly, express how he feels about it.
The second quote belongs to Charles Harbutt, who got disappointed in writing because for him there was no connection between the word you say and anything that ever existed except your own imagination. Instead of being a writer, Charles Harbutt became a photographer. And that was a piece of good fortune for those of us who appreciate photography.
These two quotes seem very connected to me. Both of these people are having issues with keeping reality the way it really is; the difference is one found a solution and another one failed. Using photovoice with older adults (the term that came from the participatory research of Wang and Burris, 1997) is gaining its methodological popularity [2]. However, there is still a long way to go. Several studies [5, 2] that used the photovoice technique were based on the idea that older adults are best experts on their quality of life, and no one knows better than them what improvements they need. Enabling people to use photography as a tool provides a richer understanding of social and personal issues that may otherwise be ignored. Thus photovoice has been used to study learning disabilities [1], chronic pain in older adults [3] perceptions of cardiovascular disease [4]; it has also been used to assess age-friendly communities [6]. These studies confirm that photography can be used as a flexible research method, particularly for vulnerable groups.
I see a great potential in using photography when working with people with dementia, and not only for the data but for their well-being. As we know, dementia is a set of symptoms including memory dysfunction (Alzheimer’s Disease International, 2010), so creating a permanent record of the daily life is an obvious benefit. It is also an additional cognitive challenge because you need to know how to use a camera, select an object and concentrate on taking a picture. On early stages of dementia, photography can positively affect thinking, memory and communication skills.
There are not many studies in the area of dementia and photography, so it is hard to say how portraying and looking at your own pictures may influence sensation and understanding of your own, sometimes elusory, identity.
Of course, there are many limitations of the use of photography in this field that need to be addressed. The method will not be suitable for every person with dementia; the process of using a camera requires assistance, and people with more severe dementia may be unable to use a camera at all. However, being a challenge photography remains to be a unique opportunity.
The uniqueness of photography is in its visual language that allows us to express something that we cannot express using words, and this is the point of doing it. A photograph is a way to preserve reality, here and now, your own visual perception. It’s memory, only better because memory will always be modified. In this sense, photography is not art because art is always an attempt to bring a new form to what already exists. So it is always some sort of illusion, and if we are lucky – a beautiful one. The same goes for memory. Not being art gives photography a chance to be a unique reliable two-dimensional visual medium that can stay with you. This little, relatively light box that can easily fit in your hands is a solution; film, lens, shutter and a bit of light are all you need to keep reality the way it is or was at some certain moment.
[1] Aldridge, J. (2007). Picture this: The use of participatory photographic research methods with people with learning disabilities. Disability and Society, 22 (1), 1-17
[2] Baker, T. A., & Wang, C. C. (2006). Capturing the Huntonton’s disease spousal carer experience: A preliminary investigation using ‘Photovoice’ method. Dementia, 5 (1), 95-116.
[3] Baker, T. & Wang, C. C. (2006). Photovoice: use of a participatory action research method to explore the chronic pain experience in older adults. Qualitative Health Research, 16(10), 1405-13.
[4] Killion, C. M., & Wang, C. C. (2000). Linking African American mothers across life stage and station through photovoice. Journal Of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 11(3), 310-25.
[5] Lockett, D., Willis, A., & Edwards, N. (2005) Through seniors’ eyes: an exploratory qualitative study to identify environmental barriers to and facilitators of walking. Canadian Journal of Nursing Research, 37(3), 48-65.
[6] Novek, S., Morris-Oswald, T., & Menec, V. (2012). Using photovoice with older adults: Some methodological strengths and issues. Ageing and Society, 32, 451-470.
[7] Wang, C., & Burris, M. A. (1997). Photovoice: Concept, methodology and use for participatory needs assessment. Health Education and Behaviour, 24(3), 369-387.
About the Author:
Daria Belostotskaia is a James Martin Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Institute of Population Ageing and a PhD candidate in Vienna University, the faculty of psychology.
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Comments Welcome: We welcome your comments on this or any of the Institute's blog posts. Please feel free to email comments to be posted on your behalf to administrator@ageing.ox.ac.uk or use the Disqus facility linked below.
