Ukulele Playing to Improve Cognition in People with Multiple Sclerosis: a Feasibility Study

Over the past 10 years, the rates of multiple sclerosis (MS) have nearly doubled in the United States. This chronic, neuroinflammatory, and neurodegenerative disease is most often diagnosed between the ages of 20-40. Cognitive impairment effects up to 70% of people with MS (PwMS) and has a detrimental impact on mental health, social connections, and employment. Further, up to 50% of PwMS also struggle with depression. Numerous cognitive rehabilitation programs are available to address cognitive impairment, but few interventions have simultaneous effects on cognition and emotional well-being. Music interventions have potential to fill this gap. Brain imaging studies on music and emotion show that music can modulate activity in the brains structures that are known to be crucially involved in emotion. Further, music engages areas of the brain that are involved with paying attention, making predictions, and updating events in our memory. The purpose of this study is to determine the feasibility of an online musical training intervention (MTI) for PwMS and explore the potential effect on cognition, psychosocial, and functional well-being compared to an active control group (music listening (ML)). The specific aims are to: 1) determine the feasibility and acceptability of delivering the MTI virtually over three months to PwMS; 2) evaluate the effect of the MTI on cognitive functioning (processing speed, working memory, cognitive flexibility, response inhibition), psychosocial (anxiety, depression, stress, quality of life, self-efficacy) and functional (insomnia) well-being compared to ML; and 3) (exploratory aim) to utilize non-invasive neuroimaging to determine if pre-intervention brain activity predicts post-intervention cognitive functioning.