This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: It was the first day of school, and the kids at the Logan Intergenerational Family Education Center were not going to wait a second longer. Normally, the hordes of elementary schoolers would take turns chattering down the hallway to meet and visit their best friends—the senior-citizen residents of the Logan Manor nursing home—during breakfast.
But on the first day of school, no kid wanted to be left behind, and no resident could pay any mind to pancakes as the two generations caught each other up on a summer full of memories lived and remembered. "It's amazing," said Teresa McComb, administrator of Logan Manor. "You can just tell when the kids are around, everybody kind of gets a little bit lighter.
They get a little more pep in their step, and they're just excited to talk to the kids, help them with different assignments and classes, and just be able to watch them and interact with them on a daily basis." It's a story of intergenerational connection in rural northwest Kansas, and a full year of research by Kansas State University experts is helping them better understand what happens when children and older adults regularly learn, interact and spend time together. That interdisciplinary K-State team has completed its first full year of data collection at the Logan Intergenerational Family Education Center, or LIFE Center, where an elementary school and 36-bed nursing home are connected within the same facility. Preliminary findings show improved mood and greater independence in daily activities among nursing home residents, increased social-emotional development among children and measurable differences in the new nursing home environment that support residents' quality of life.
Researchers in psychological sciences, gerontology and interior design are looking at different parts of life at the center, from residents' health and experiences to children's development and the role the physical environment plays in bringing the generations together. "This project is highly interdisciplinary, which has made it possible to document outcomes from multiple lenses; the richness of the data is remarkable," said Laci Cornelison, director of K-State's Center on Aging and chair of the gerontology program. Heather Bailey, associate professor of psychological sciences, and researchers in K-State's Memory and Aging Laboratory analyzed data from 30 Logan Manor residents at two points approximately one year apart.
Residents' cognitive functioning remained stable during that time, while symptoms of depression decreased and independence in daily activities increased. Cornelison, Justine Irving, associate teaching professor of gerontology, and undergraduate researcher Michael Glenn have added the residents' own experiences to that data. They interviewed 17 residents about life in their new environment and their participation in intergenerational activities, hearing about the many opportunities to continue doing what matters to them.
Beyond the activities, residents described how simply having more people around has changed their days. "I'm sure there are people that aren't happy to be here, but I don't feel that way," one resident told the research team. "I was living alone for 21 years.
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