Floro

This research focuses on adults aged 65 or older living with Alzheimer's disease (AD) who live at home in Argentina, Austria, and Norway. It aims to understand how learning new songs through active music interventions, especially singing, affects cognitive functions, behavior, and brain activity. While music has shown benefits for mood and quality of life in people with dementia, its impact on cognition is less known and is being studied here. Participants will undergo two types of musical training in a random order: an intensive training with sessions twice a week for five months, and a minimal training with sessions once a month for five months. There is a two-month break between these periods. Each session lasts 30 to 40 minutes and follows a structured plan including mood observation, warm-up, learning and singing song choruses, and session ratings. The songs chosen are similar in complexity and length, and all sessions are video-recorded and reviewed to ensure quality. During the study, participants will be evaluated on general cognition using the Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale - Cognitive (ADAS-cog) at multiple points up to 12 months. Memory for music will be assessed through behavioral tasks, observations, and brain responses measured by EEG during listening to melodies with specific musical changes. Mood will also be measured in every session using a simple emoji scale. The study will explore how mood and musical memory relate to cognitive changes and whether factors like age, sex, disease stage, or previous musical experience influence outcomes. A total of 113 participants will be included to detect meaningful effects reliably.