Efforts to Minimize Confusion and Disorientation: Cognitive Support in Informal Dementia Caregiving

• In Event: 378 - Open Refereed Roundtable Session II
  In Refereed Roundtable: B. Table 10. Health and Wellness

Abstract

Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews, I explain how informal dementia caregivers attempt to reduce the affected individual’s moments of confusion and disorientation through cognitive support work. I identify the three stages in which such support takes shape and then comes to an end. Early on, family members collaborate with affected individuals to first identify and then to avoid “triggers” that elicit sudden bouts of confusion. As the disease progresses, caregivers begin unilateral attempts to minimize confused states through pre-emptive conversational techniques, third-party interactional support, and social-environment shifts. In a post-support phase, caregivers learn that the affected individual has reached a level of impairment that does not respond well to efforts at reduction and begin abandoning strategies. I identify the motivations behind providing cognitive support and discuss the role of lay health knowledge in dementia caregiving. I conclude by considering the utility of cognitive support as a concept within dementia caregiving and beyond.

Author

• Brandon Berry, Duke University