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Snoezelen Multisensory Stimulation (SMSS) is a non‐pharmacological intervention that provides controlled multisensorial environments to stimulate the primary senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, proprioceptive and vestibular. Even though the use and potential of SMSS have been widespread in the literature regarding certain target populations (autism, developmental disabilities) and settings (e.g. leisure, therapeutic), its effectiveness in older adults with neurocognitive disorders (e.g. dementia, mild cognitive impairment) and other pathologies (e.g. psychiatric disorders, oncological diseases) is still unclear. Therefore, a systematic review of the literature was conducted to address this issue. The recommendations of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta‐Analyses (PRISMA) and of the Cochrane Collaboration were followed. An initial search on PubMed and Scopus databases resulted in 86 articles of which 14 met inclusion criteria and were reviewed in detail. The outcomes showed that most of the studies (n = 13) focused on the effects of SMSS on behaviour and mood in older adults with major cognitive disorders (i.e. dementia). Although there is scarce literature on its impact on cognition, psychophysiological measures (e.g. heart rate, oxygen saturation), daily living functionality and quality of life, this type of intervention seems to contribute to delaying the worsening in severity of the neurocognitive disorders from the mildest to the most severe stages. Likewise, it is legitimate to consider the possibility of potential benefits to older adults with less severe neurocognitive disorders or other pathologies, but more research is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: This review aimed to evaluate the effects of multisensory environments/stimulation (MSE/MSS) therapy, on the behavior and psychological symptoms in adults with cognitive impairment and/or special needs. Methods: Online database searches were performed to identify studies reporting on the effects of MSS/MSE therapy in adults (>18 years). Data were extracted for the following investigated outcomes including anxiety, depression, mood, behavioral attributes, biomedical parameters, cognition, motor skills, quality of life (QoL), pain, and end of life quality. Two reciprocally blinded investigators extracted the data. Inter‐investigator reliability (흹) was calculated. A meta‐analysis and a qualitative analysis were performed on the information extracted. Results: Thirty‐six studies were included for data extraction and analysis. Meta‐analysis of the included studies revealed a significant improvement with the MSE/MSS therapy, for agitation (p =.018), anxiety (p =.023), cognition (p <.001), and depression (p <.001). MSS/MSE therapy demonstrated a tendency for the improvement of the QoL in adults (p =.05). Conclusion: MSE/MSS therapies are beneficial in cognitively impaired adults and improve their anxiety, depression, cognitive and other behavioral attributes such as agitative behaviors. Promoting these therapies in geriatric care may help to improve/reduce the challenging/care‐resistant behaviors in adults and facilitate effective provision of the necessary care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The hemodynamic response function (HRF) measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging is generated by vascular and metabolic responses evoked by brief (<4 s) stimuli. It is known that the human HRF varies across cortex, between subjects, with stimulus paradigms, and even between different measurements in the same cortical location. However, our results demonstrate that strong HRFs are remarkably repeatable across sessions separated by time intervals up to 3 months. In this study, a multisensory stimulus was used to activate and measure the HRF across the majority of cortex (>70%, with lesser reliability observed in some areas of prefrontal cortex). HRFs were measured with high spatial resolution (2‐mm voxels) in central gray matter to minimize variations caused by partial‐volume effects. HRF amplitudes and temporal dynamics were highly repeatable across four sessions in 20 subjects. Positive and negative HRFs were consistently observed across sessions and subjects. Negative HRFs were generally weaker and, thus, more variable than positive HRFs. Statistical measurements showed that across‐session variability is highly correlated to the variability across events within a session; these measurements also indicated a normal distribution of variability across cortex. The overall repeatability of the HRFs over long time scales generally supports the long‐term use of event‐related functional magnetic resonance imaging protocols. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several models have been developed to analyse cortical activity in response to salient events constituted by multiple sensory modalities. In particular, additive models compare event‐related potentials (ERPs) in response to stimuli from two or more concomitant sensory modalities with the ERPs evoked by unimodal stimuli, in order to study sensory interactions. In this approach, components that are not specific to a sensory modality are commonly disregarded, although they likely carry information about stimulus expectation and evaluation, attentional orientation and other cognitive processes. In this study, we present an analytical method to assess the contribution of modality‐specific and nonspecific components to the ERP. We developed an experimental setup that recorded ERPs in response to four stimulus types (visual, auditory, and two somatosensory modalities to test for stimulus specificity) in three different conditions (unimodal, bimodal and trimodal stimulation) and recorded the saliency of these stimuli relative to the sensory background. Stimuli were delivered in pairs, in order to study the effects of habituation. To this end, spatiotemporal features (peak amplitudes and latencies at different scalp locations) were analysed using linear mixed models. Results showed that saliency relative to the sensory background increased with the number of concomitant stimuli. We also observed that the spatiotemporal features of modality‐specific components derived from this method likely reflect the amount and type of sensory input. Furthermore, the nonspecific component reflected habituation occurring for the second stimulus in the pair. In conclusion, this method provides an alternative to study neural mechanisms of responses to multisensory stimulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depression is one of the most common mental disorders, predicted to be the leading cause of disease burden by the next decade. There is great deal of emphasis on the central origin and potential therapeutics of depression whereby the symptomatology of depression has been interpreted and treated as brain generated dysfunctions filtering down to the periphery. This top‐down approach has found strong support from clinical work and basic neuroscientific research. Nevertheless, despite great advances in our knowledge of the aetiology and therapeutics of depression, success in treatment is still by no means assured. As a consequence, a wide net has been cast by both clinicians and researchers in search of more efficient therapies for mood disorders. As a complementary view, the present integrative review advocates approaching mood and depression from the opposite perspective: a bottom‐up view that starts from the periphery. Specifically, evidence is provided to show that sensory stimulation via the visual, auditory, olfactory, and gustatory systems can modulate depression. The review shows how—depending on several parameters—unisensory stimulation via these modalities can ameliorate or aggravate depressive symptoms. Moreover, the review emphasises the bidirectional relationship between sensory stimulation and depression. Just as peripheral stimulation can modulate depression, depression in turn affects—and in most cases impairs—sensory reception. Furthermore, the review suggests that combined use of multisensory stimulation may have synergistic ameliorative effects on depressive symptoms over and above what has so far been documented for unisensory stimulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The aim was to determine the effect of multisensory stimulation (MSS) on the depression and anxiety status among nursing home‐dwelling elderly people in Ahvaz, Iran. Design and Methods: This clinical trial study conducted on 28 old people living in nursing homes in Ahvaz, who were divided into two groups of intervention and control. The interventions included sensory stimulations of touch, sound, and sight for 4 weeks and 3 sessions weekly and 25 min per each session. Findings: The mean depression and anxiety scores of the intervention group before and after the intervention were 14.5 ± 5.5 and 10.1 ± 5.3 and, 9.6 ± 8.1 and 6.1 ± 6.2, respectively. Practice Implications: MSS could improve the condition of depression and anxiety in the elderly nursing home residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Seeing a face being touched in spatial and temporal synchrony with the own face produces a bias in self‐recognition, whereby the other face becomes more likely to be perceived as the self. The present study employed event‐related potentials to explore whether this enfacement effect reflects initial face encoding, enhanced distinctiveness of the enfaced face, modified self‐identity representations, or even later processing stages that are associated with the emotional processing of faces. Participants were stroked in synchrony or asynchrony with an unfamiliar face they observed on a monitor in front of them, in a situation approximating a mirror image. Subsequently, event‐related potentials were recorded during the presentation of (a) a previously synchronously stimulated face, (b) an asynchronously stimulated face, (c) observers’ own face, (d) filler faces, and (e) a to‐be‐detected target face, which required a response. Observers reported a consistent enfacement illusion after synchronous stimulation. Importantly, the synchronously stimulated face elicited more prominent N170 and P200 responses than the asynchronously stimulated face. By contrast, similar N250 and P300 responses were observed in these conditions. These results suggest that enfacement modulates early neural correlates of face encoding and facial prototypicality, rather than identity self‐representations and associated emotional processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To investigate the effectiveness ofsnoezelen, integrated in 24-hour daily care, on the behavior and mood of demented nursing home residents.Quasiexperimental pre- and posttest design.Twelve psychogeriatric wards of six nursing homes, spread over different parts of the Netherlands.One hundred twenty-five patients with moderate to severe dementia and care dependency were included in the pretest and 128 in the posttest; 61 were completers (included in both pre- and posttest).Experimental subjects received an individual 24-hoursnoezelprogram, based on family history taking and stimulus preference screening. Caregivers were trained, and (organizational) adaptations were made to fulfill the conditions for resident-orientedsnoezelcare. The control group received usual nursing home care.Observations were made on the wards using subscales of the Dutch Behavior Observation Scale for Psychogeriatric Inpatients, the Dutch version of the Cohen-Mansfield Agitation Inventory, and the Cornell Scale for Depression in Dementia. Independent assessors observed video recordings of morning care and rated residents' behavior and mood using INTERACT and FACE, respectively.Residents receivingsnoezelcare demonstrated a significant treatment effect with respect to their level of apathetic behavior, loss of decorum, rebellious behavior, aggressive behavior, and depression. During morning care, the experimental subjects showed significant changes in well-being (mood, happiness, enjoyment, sadness) and adaptive behavior (responding to speaking, relating to caregiver, normal-length sentences).Snoezelcare particularly seems to have a positive effect on disturbing and withdrawn behavior. The results suggest that a 24-hour integratedsnoezelprogram has a generalizing effect on the mood and behavior of demented residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depression is one of the most common mental disorders, predicted to be the leading cause of disease burden by the next decade. There is great deal of emphasis on the central origin and potential therapeutics of depression whereby the symptomatology of depression has been interpreted and treated as brain generated dysfunctions filtering down to the periphery. This top-down approach has found strong support from clinical work and basic neuroscientific research. Nevertheless, despite great advances in our knowledge of the aetiology and therapeutics of depression, success in treatment is still by no means assured. As a consequence, a wide net has been cast by both clinicians and researchers in search of more efficient therapies for mood disorders. As a complementary view, the present integrative review advocates approaching mood and depression from the opposite perspective: a bottom-up view that starts from the periphery. Specifically, evidence is provided to show that sensory stimulation via the visual, auditory, olfactory, and gustatory systems can modulate depression. The review shows how-depending on several parameters-unisensory stimulation via these modalities can ameliorate or aggravate depressive symptoms. Moreover, the review emphasises the bidirectional relationship between sensory stimulation and depression. Just as peripheral stimulation can modulate depression, depression in turn affects-and in most cases impairs-sensory reception. Furthermore, the review suggests that combined use of multisensory stimulation may have synergistic ameliorative effects on depressive symptoms over and above what has so far been documented for unisensory stimulation., (© 2021 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)