Understanding interaction in problematic dementia and social care encounters

Project Description

It is well established that care-home workers have a far-reaching influence on the well-being of the people they look after. However, they are a section of the healthcare workforce that has traditionally been under-valued and under-trained. This study builds directly on research which has highlighted the importance of the ‘hidden’ naturalistic skills underpinning much high-quality care work (i.e. skills and behaviours that are not necessarily part of routine care-worker training, but which have a significant impact on quality of care). It will focus specifically on a detailed analysis of how care workers deal with a range of situations that they often find particularly challenging through observational methods, by video-recording a wide range of every-day activity in a number of care homes, looking particularly for instances when care workers deal with difficult situations. Conversation Analysis will be used to analyse the recordings and uncover how the step-by-step actions and re-actions of the people involved lead to a successful (or otherwise) outcome. A key part of our approach will be to use a process called stimulated recall. This will allow care workers and others taking part in the study to view the video material that they feature in and share their perspectives on it. Ultimately, we hope to use the knowledge we gain to produce recommendations that can make a significant practical contribution to future care-worker training.