Considerations for designing and facilitating a group (online) songwriting programme with the potential to benefit wellbeing of cognitively healthy older adult participants

This thesis proposes a pragmatic guide for delivering an (online) group songwriting programme with the potential to benefit the wellbeing of older adult participants. This guide was part of a contribution to a larger study investigating cognitive and neural wellbeing benefits to older adults participating in group songwriting. With the average life-expectancy increasing, there is burgeoning interest into maintaining quality-of-life for older people. The numerous potential benefits of group songwriting are advocated by current music therapy literature, yet there are no practical guides for its delivery. In promoting music’s use in benefiting wellbeing for older adults, the author has developed a practical guide and programme based on music therapy, older-adult music education, and songwriting literature. The resultant guide and programme were refined through their practical use in a trial with 11 older adults. Potential benefits in the trial were identified through facilitator journaling of participant observations, which were triangulated with participant feedback, the song produced, focus groups and an NVivo analysis of session transcripts. Potential positive benefits of the programme are aligned and discussed within the PERMA wellbeing model (Seligman, 2011) and Gick’s (2011) model for health and wellbeing. The trial suggests potential life enhancement through 1) meaning-making; 2) personal relationships; 3) accomplishment, and; 4) empowerment. A major aim of this research is to enhance further investigation of these areas in a larger ongoing parent study.