Centre for Policy on Ageing



I'm still the same person — the impact of early-stage dementia on identity
Author(s)	Lisa S Caddell, Linda Clare
Journal title	Dementia: the international journal of social research and practice, vol 10, no 3, August 2011
Pages	pp 379-398
Source	http://dem.sagepub.com/
Keywords	Dementia ; Attitude ; Self esteem.
Annotation	Research suggests that the onset and progression of dementia may pose a threat to a person's sense of identity. This qualitative study used Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to explore participants' perceptions of the impact of dementia on their identity. Participants were ten people with dementia. The four themes emerging from the data represented participants' views on aspects of their current identities, whether they believed that dementia would alter their identities in the future, perceptions of how dementia had affected their lifestyle, and relationships with friends and family. The analysis suggested that for the most part, participants felt that little had changed with respect to their identities as a whole, but most identified features of themselves that were different than they had been prior to the onset of dementia. Thus it appeared that participants were in a state of flux, experiencing both continuity and change in their sense of identity simultaneously. (JL).
Accession Number	CPA-111003018 A
Classmark	EA: DP: DPA
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing

...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.