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| In der folgenden Übersicht finden Sie Themenbereiche, Einzelthemen und ev. extern betreute Einzelthemen vor. Bei Interesse wenden Sie sich bitte an eine der genannten Kontaktpersonen. Bitte fügen Sie Ihrer Bewerbung für eine Masterarbeit neben einem kurzen Lebenslauf auch ein ca. einseitiges Motivationsschreiben bei, in welchem Sie erklären, warum Sie sich für das Forschungsprojekt bewerben. Die Masterarbeit darf erst nach Rücksprache mit der/dem Ko-Betreuer/in gebucht werden. Empfohlen wird, die Masterarbeit parallel zum Forschungskolloquium 2 zu buchen. |
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Beschreibung: Mobility and cognition are two important aspects in healthy aging. Most research on this topic has relied on self-report questionnaires with a cross-sectional design. This thesis aims to overcome these limitations and examine associations between mobility and cognition with a novel dataset. Specifically, you will work on a multidisciplinary dataset that includes 6 years longitudinal data collected with GPS sensors, smartphone questionnaires, and in-lab questionnaires. You will investigate how day-to-day mobility is associated with long-term cognitive changes in healthy Swiss older adults. The thesis will be written in English.
De Silva, N. A., Gregory, M. A., Venkateshan, S. S., Verschoor, C. P., & Kuspinar, A. (2019). Examining the association between life?space mobility and cognitive function in older adults: a systematic review. Journal of Aging Research, 2019(1), 3923574.
Luo, M., Kim, E. K., Weibel, R., Martin, M., & Röcke, C. (2023). GPS-derived daily mobility and daily well-being in community-dwelling older adults. Gerontology, 69(7), 875-887.
Kontakt: Dr. Minxia Luo, E-Mail
Beschreibung: It has been long acknowledged that emotions have an impact on health. Yet, work is needed to estimate the monetary value of promoting positive emotions in health care. This thesis aims to examine a large-scale population panel data to estimate relations between different emotions and health care utilization. Your effort in writing this thesis will contribute to the promotion of health of older adults. The thesis will be written in English.
Kim, E. S., Kubzansky, L. D., & Smith, J. (2015). Life satisfaction and use of preventive health care services. Health Psychology, 34(7), 779.
Richman, L. S., Kubzansky, L., Maselko, J., Kawachi, I., Choo, P., & Bauer, M. (2005). Positive emotion and health: going beyond the negative. Health psychology, 24(4), 422.
Kontakt: Dr. Minxia Luo, E-Mail
Beschreibung: Research has shown that an active engagement of daily activities (physical, social, and cognitive) is important for older adults to stay healthy and independent. Yet, relatively little research has examined the monetary value of this lifestyle, in terms of health care utilization. This thesis aims to examine a large-scale population panel data to estimate relations between daily activities and health care utilization. Your effort in writing this thesis will offer an important evidence about the value of an active lifestyle and contribute to the promotion of health of older adults. The thesis will be written in English.
Carlson, S. A., Fulton, J. E., Pratt, M., Yang, Z., & Adams, E. K. (2015). Inadequate physical activity and health care expenditures in the United States. Progress in cardiovascular diseases, 57(4), 315-323.
Valtorta, N. K., Moore, D. C., Barron, L., Stow, D., & Hanratty, B. (2018). Older adults? social relationships and health care utilization: a systematic review. American journal of public health, 108(4), e1-e10.
Kontakt: Dr. Minxia Luo, E-Mail
Beschreibung: Active engagement of daily activities (physical, social, and cognitive) is important for older adults to stay healthy and independent. Most existing research focused on examining a single type of daily activity of older adults, but have insufficiently investigated the roles of different combinations of daily activities in health and well-being.
The large multidisciplinary research project of mobility, activity, and social interactions study (MOASIS) was developed to address this research gap. It designed a custom-built mobile sensor "uTrail", including GPS, accelerometer, and audio recording, to track older adults' daily activities. As part of the ongoing MOASIS research efforts, this master thesis aims to conduct a validation study of the accelerometer sensor in comparison to several other existing and validated physical activity sensors.
For this aim, the key tasks of the thesis include collecting, analyzing, and interpreting physical activity data from accelerometers. With guidance of experienced researchers and technical experts, you will have the chance to work with mobile sensing technology, digital markers, and gain experiences of running your own study using these tools. You should be interested in learning and using digital health tools and have experience in statistical inference.
Röcke, C., Luo, M., Bereuter, P., Katana, M., Fillekes, M., Gehriger, V., ... & Weibel, R. (2023). Charting everyday activities in later life: Study protocol of the mobility, activity, and social interactions study (MOASIS). Frontiers in Psychology, 13, 1011177.
Amagasa, S., Kamada, M., Sasai, H., Fukushima, N., Kikuchi, H., Lee, I. M., & Inoue, S. (2019). How well iPhones measure steps in free-living conditions: cross-sectional validation study. JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 7(1), e10418.
Kontakt: Dr. Minxia Luo, E-Mail
Beschreibung: Over half of older adults living in residential aged care settings report significant levels of anxiety and depression. Traditionally, staff who care for older adults have limited education and resources available to assist them to respond to psychological distress in the moment.
We are commencing a project to educate staff on the use of an evidence-based intervention called music-assisted reminiscence therapy (MRT) to help address the varied psychological and emotional needs of older adults. This project is part of a grant awarded to Romy Engelbrecht (University of Queensland, visiting UZH until Feb 24) by the Swiss government and will be conducted in the healthy longevity centre UZH within the research group CoupleSense: Health and Interpersonal Emotion Regulation (head: Andrea B. Horn). It involves conducting training with aged care staff on the intervention and collecting and analysing mixed research data on psychological resources in aging and how they can be supported in a culturally sensitive way by short interventions provided by the staff. The master?s thesis will be conducted at the unit ?Gerontopsychology and Gerontology? in the psychology department at the University of Zurich, chair: Professor Dr. Mike Martin.
Your responsibilities:
? Support preparing communication between institutions and participants
? Support the implementation and development of written training resources
? Assist the research team to conduct a staff training program
? Assist with the transcription of data recordings
? Support the research team with mixed data collection and analysis.
Your profile:
? Currently studying psychology as a master?s student.
? Have an interest in Gerontology, or working with mental health and wellbeing.
? You have excellent communication skills, organisational skills, and attention to detail.
? You have advanced English and German Skills (Swiss German also highly regarded).
? Interest and/or experience in qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis.
What we offer:
We offer a collaborative and stimulating international research environment with varied work tasks and flexible working times. This project will offer the opportunity to learn practical and clinical skills in the evidence-based intervention of music-assisted reminiscence therapy from an international expert, and allow you to obtain experience with qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis.
You will have the opportunity to develop your own research question within in the project. Though involvement in the project is expected as soon as possible, the planning of the master thesis development is open for discussion (co-supervisor: Andrea B. Horn).
Start of project
Immediately (the intervention phase ends February 2024; Master thesis time line open for discussion)
Applications should include: motivation letter, CV, bachelor thesis. If available: reference letters referring to earlier work (any). Applications are welcome as soon as possible best before October 15 2023.
Kontakt: Dr. Andrea Horn, E-Mail
Beschreibung: Lifelong learning is the continuous development of knowledge and skills throughout life and is not limited to formal education. One of the most successful providers of lifelong learning is the Universities for the Third Age (i.e., Seniors universities). Past research shows that continuing to learn in old age (60+) is positively associated with the maintenance and enhancement of cognitive functioning, psychological well-being and social integration.
Although there is large variation in the ICT (i.e., information and communication technologies) skills and interests of adults 60+, the current trend is that more and more 60+ are highly competent in these technologies. There is agreement in the literature that online educational programs can be effective in addressing the diverse characteristics of aging individuals. There is no typical senior learner, as they tend to have different cognitive, motivational and physical states. E-learning can support this diversity by allowing for self-directed and self-paced learning.
Thus, we are developing a distance learning platform specifically designed for 60+ in collaboration with Swiss Seniors Universities. The offered thesis projects will review the literature on lifelong learning and e-learning in old age, and present the current trends, challenges and opportunities in this field. It will include interviews and surveys with seniors who are currently using our distance learning platform. We offer more than one thesis on the topic, with a focus on different aspects, such as: (a) seniors' learning needs and styles, (b) seniors' UX design needs/interests and usability testing of the platform, (c) data analytics (developing learning analytics on the platform to track seniors' online behavior), (d) reaching out to seniors who have weaker digital skills and onboarding them on the platform, and (e) development of new and age-targeted course-content.
Narushima, M., Liu, J., & Diestelkamp, N. (2018). Lifelong learning in active ageing discourse: Its conserving effect on wellbeing, health and vulnerability. Ageing & Society, 38(4), 651-675.
Zadworna, M. (2020). Healthy Aging and the University of the Third Age-Health Behavior and Subjective Health Outcomes in Older Adults. Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics, 104126.
Githens, R. P. (2007). Older adults and e-learning: Opportunities and barriers. Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 8(4), 329.
De Palo, V., Limone, P., Monacis, L., Ceglie, F., & Sinatra, M. (2018). Enhancing E-Learning in Old Age. Australian Journal of Adult Learning, 58(1), 88-109.
Kontakt: Dr. Burcu Demiray, E-Mail
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