Primary Co-Facilitation Team: Cynthia Friesen, BCBWP Course Facilitator • Tara Gaertner, PhD, Faculty of Medicine, Psychiatry • Peter Gouzouasis, PhD, Dept of Curriculum and Pedagogy, Faculty of Education • Silke Cresswell, PhD, Director of BCBWP, Faculty of Medicine, Neurology
Advisors: Prof. Emeritus Debra Sheet, PhD, UVic Faculty of Nursing • Julia Ulehla, MA, School of Music, Ethnomusicology and Interdisciplinary Studies
Undergraduate Research Assistants: Gael Hernadez-Palmer, Neuroscience • Manat Siddhu, Psychology
Principle Investigator: Prof. Rena Sharon, MMus, School of Music, Collaborative Piano
While previous research has shown that group singing has clear benefits for mental and physical wellbeing, there is less data showing how well these benefits transfer to a virtual singing group. Because high-latency audio lag has been common to virtual platforms, online group singing groups often have participants muted, so that only the facilitator can be heard. Emergent technology now offers the possibility of low-latency synchronous audio that allows participants to hear each other sing collectively in real-time.
Building from SingWell’s pilot study by Dr. Arla Good and Dr. Alex Pachete at Toronto Metropolitan University, this study assessed how hearing each other sing together modulates the benefits participants experience from group singing.
This project built on SingWell’s Virtual Group-Singing research network through a 12-week study of a multi-modal, multi-strand virtual group-singing course designed for individuals living with Parkinson’s and other neurological conditions, and also welcoming care partners of any age, and general community participants through the BC Brain Wellness Program’s “Healthy aging” activities at UBC’s Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health.
We compared the physiological and emotional effects of muted participation in a high-latency audio virtual singing group to one in which a low latency (minimal lag) platform allowed all participants to be synchronously audible to each other in real-time.
We measured changes in mood, pain, and social connection via questionnaires administered before and after each session. Salivary samples were collected before and after selected sessions to assess changes in cortisol, and baseline heart rate variability was calculated from heart rate recordings made at the beginning, middle, and end of the study. In addition, focus groups and individual interviews after the singing course revealed qualitative data about participant’s experiences in the singing group.
Our data indicate that there are benefits within both audio modalities, and assets and challenges specific to each. Results show that online group singing in either format leads to improvements in mood, decreased pain, decreased salivary cortisol, and increased feelings of connection with the group and the world as a whole.
In comparing the two modalities we find a trend towards additional benefits for synchronous singing only for mood and social connectedness, suggesting that benefits for pain and physiological measures of stress may be driven by the physical effects of singing, (i.e. controlled breathing), rather than the social aspects of group singing.
These early results support the viabilities and efficacies of both virtual group singing audio options as a meaningful alternative to in-person activities for those with access challenges, and suggest that synchronized low-latency audio platforms might offer additional benefits in mood and social bonding.
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Ⓒ 2020-2024, The SingWell Project