Page 15 - Stories_of_Older_Adults

T H E S T U D Y : C A N D O C U M E N T I N G O L D E R A D U L T S ’ L I F E S T O R I E S I M P R O V E D E N T A L S T U D E N T S ’ E M P A T H Y ?

W H A T W E P L A N N E D
C O N T I N U A T I O N

Our initial plan emphasised face-to-face communication, with
fieldwork at a nearby soup kitchen. Students would volunteer to help
and mingle with people there. Then, they would approach one of the
visitors and invite them to be interviewed and photographed for a life-
story exhibition. As we were about to start the project in late 2019, the
COVID-19 pandemic happened. The Movement Control Order was
announced, and no physical activities were allowed on campus.

As the pandemic continued, we decided to conduct the study online. This would keep the older adults,
the students, and the researchers safe. However, there would also be constraints. Nevertheless, we
persevered and made the following changes:

Communication skills training would be conducted online.

The students would interview older adults who could participate in online/telephone interviews.

Instead of photographing the interviewee, the students would create a multi-modal biography
using visuals and text, along with a narrative write up.
Since an exhibition may not be possible, we would share the life stories via a website and an
e-book (the one you’re reading now).
We would collect various types of data, including recorded interviews, recorded training
sessions and student video logs (vlogs).

A dental student preparing the multimodal Examples of multimodal biographies done by the students
biography of an older adult

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