Shared Reality

Shared reality is the experience of a common inner state - thoughts, feelings, or perceptions about an object or situation - between two or more people, established through communication and mutual acknowledgement. In dementia care and accessibility research, sustaining shared reality is a known challenge because memory gaps, word-finding difficulties, and confabulation can cause the realities of people with dementia and their interaction partners to diverge. Interventions that help co-construct or negotiate shared reality - through reminiscence, creative play, or co-created AI outputs - are associated with stronger social connectedness and preserved personhood.