We’ve all known that masks impair all sorts of normal human social functioning: they muffle speech, they prevent the hearing impaired from lip-reading, they basically render speech therapy services almost useless (and this is just for starters). They also impair social cognition.
We all know that masks on nursing home patients have enormous downsides (which I yelled about here). Apparently some very smart neuroscientists have confirmed that for older adults, masking is especially bad for their ability to “read” faces (which, for an older adult with aphasia s/t dementia, is often what they fall back on). In other words, for older adults, they depend far more on the mouth to read emotions than the eyes
The last author, Simon baron Cohen, does his work in the realm of autism and ASD. (yes, related to the actor Sasha with the same last name) His group came up with a screening technique for identifying people with autism or on "the spectrum", back in the late 1990s.
I've worked with elderly many years of my life and agree whole heartedly. Mark Changizi writes at length about this very subject regarding all ages. I cannot fathom the harm done in institutional settings. Aside from the idea masks were such a huge mistake (good friend still forced to wear at her job for 12 hours a day), they are utterly dehumanizing and plenty of studies (those not forcibly retracted) have shown no benefit and in fact detriment. Thank you for advocating.
I’m very appreciative that some neuroscientists have figured out masks bad for older people (insert eye roll here). Their “actions” are extremely laughable though especially for LTC-not one of those things are actually doable with current state of “emergency” in nursing homes. Dementia patients so not understand “teleconsultation” at all-seeing their families faces in iPads made things worse in cases. Transparent faces masks still muffle voices (not mush help for HOH).
I’m assuming this was written during pandemic prior to vax. Like when the virtuous were signaling “stay home save lives” and terrified the gullible into thinking isolating older people was somehow best for them including not even seeing them outside? So exactly HOW were the rest of those things going to get down? Early treatment/recognition? Focus on at “risk cohorts”? Once again ivory tower idiots think they are brilliant yet have zero idea how real life actually functions
I’m also sad that if this was done earlier on it was apparently soundly ignored by everyone.
The last author, Simon baron Cohen, does his work in the realm of autism and ASD. (yes, related to the actor Sasha with the same last name) His group came up with a screening technique for identifying people with autism or on "the spectrum", back in the late 1990s.
I've worked with elderly many years of my life and agree whole heartedly. Mark Changizi writes at length about this very subject regarding all ages. I cannot fathom the harm done in institutional settings. Aside from the idea masks were such a huge mistake (good friend still forced to wear at her job for 12 hours a day), they are utterly dehumanizing and plenty of studies (those not forcibly retracted) have shown no benefit and in fact detriment. Thank you for advocating.
I’m very appreciative that some neuroscientists have figured out masks bad for older people (insert eye roll here). Their “actions” are extremely laughable though especially for LTC-not one of those things are actually doable with current state of “emergency” in nursing homes. Dementia patients so not understand “teleconsultation” at all-seeing their families faces in iPads made things worse in cases. Transparent faces masks still muffle voices (not mush help for HOH).
I’m assuming this was written during pandemic prior to vax. Like when the virtuous were signaling “stay home save lives” and terrified the gullible into thinking isolating older people was somehow best for them including not even seeing them outside? So exactly HOW were the rest of those things going to get down? Early treatment/recognition? Focus on at “risk cohorts”? Once again ivory tower idiots think they are brilliant yet have zero idea how real life actually functions
I’m also sad that if this was done earlier on it was apparently soundly ignored by everyone.