Candace Kemp
Professor Gerontology, Sociology- Education
Ph.D., McMaster University
M.A., McMaster University
B.A., Brock University
- Specializations
Long-term care, care work, relationships, networks, and partnerships, ethics in long-term care, dementia care experiences and care partner training, intimacy, family, and social relationships, and end of life.
- Biography
Dr. Candace L. Kemp is a Professor of Gerontology at Georgia State University and has an appointment in the Department of Sociology. She earned her Ph.D. in Sociology at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and completed postdoctoral fellowships at Western University in London, Ontario, Canada, and at Georgia State University.
Dr. Kemp was the Gerontology Institute’s first Undergraduate Director, supervised the Internship program, and previously served as Graduate Director. A long-standing editorial board member for the Journal of Applied Gerontology and a former associate editor of the Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences, Dr. Kemp is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America (GSA) and a Victor W. Marshall Fellow and GRITS award recipient, both given by the Southern Gerontological Society. Dr. Kemp is a member of Georgia’s Long-term Care Ombudsman Advisory Council. She is a former co-convener of GSA’s Assisted Living Special Interest Group.Research Interests and Activity
Dr. Kemp’s research recent examines long-term care arrangements, partnerships, networks, and experiences, including ethics; dementia care; meaningful engagement; and end-of-life experiences from the perspectives of older adults and their myriad of paid and unpaid care partners. Much of her research is funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and seeks to improve quality of life for older adults and those who support them. Her recent research is focused on persons living with dementia and includes three overlapping areas of work. First, the recently ended project, “Meaningful Engagement and Quality of Life among Assisted Living Residents with Dementia” (R01AG062310 to Kemp) sought to learn how to promote meaningful engagement among persons living with dementia. Supplemental funding for this project investigated ethics in long-term care and involves collaboration with WellStar Health Systems.
A second and related area of work involves Dr. Kemp’s collaboration with actor, educator, and counselor, Amanda Lee Williams, Program Director of Improving through Improv and Dad’s Garage Theatre ensemble member. This work involves the development and testing of novel education programs designed to improve care experiences for persons living with dementia and their care partners. Focused on family and friends, “Improving Care though Improv: Promoting Mastery in the Moment,” was funded through the Emory Roybal Center for Dementia Caregiving Mastery, which is supported by the NIA at NIH. Collaboration focused on training healthcare and long-term care workers is funded by Georgia Gear, with support from Emory University through funding from the Health Services and Resources Administration. This work involves educating physicians, nurses, and other health care professionals and direct care workers, including students in training.
Finally, Dr. Kemp is a co-investigator on the ongoing INSPIRE Study which is led by Dr. Molly M. Perkins from Emory University and funded by the NIA at NIH. Set in Georgia, the project is a statewide study designed to learn ways to better support families and others caring for residents in assisted living with advanced dementia.
- Publications
Dr. Kemp’s most recent publications include:
- Sease, J. S. & Kemp, C. L. (2024). Examining engagement calendar deviations in assisted living: A focus on residents with dementia. Journal of Applied Gerontology. Online first: https://doi.org/10.1177/07334648241306572
- Kemp, C. L., Morgan, J. C., Bender, A. A., Hill. A. M., Anglin, E., Burgess, E. O., Epps, F., & Perkins, M. M. (2024). “Just join them”: Improv and dementia care. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 43(3), 302-309. https://doi.org/10.1177/07334648231203195
- Vandenberg, A. E., Bender, A. A., Kemp, C. L., & Perkins, M. M. (2024). Resident and caregiver dyads talk about death and dying in assisted living: A typology of communication behaviors. Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, 41(9),1011-1017. https://doi.org/10.1177/10499091231225960
- Morgan, J. C., Jason, K. J., Kemp, C. L., & Bhattacharyya, K. K. (2024). A collaborative approach to improving care outcomes for residents in assisted living. Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine, 10. https://doi.org/10.1177/23337214231222981
- Turner, K., Kemp, C. L., Lesandrini, J., Madison, B., & Donohue, E. (2024). Bioethics in gerontology: Developing a typology of ethical issues in assisted living. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 43(5), 520-526. https://doi.org/10.1177/07334648231211471
- Kemp, C. L., Skipper, A. D., Bender, A. A., & Perkins, M. M. (2023). Turning it over to God: African American assisted living residents’ end-of-life preferences and advance care planning. The Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 78(10), 1747-1755. https://doi.org/10.1093/geronb/gbad100
- Kemp, C. L., Bender, A. A., Morgan J. C., Burgess, E. O., Epps, F. R., Hill, A. M., & Perkins, M. M. (2023). Understanding capacity and optimizing meaningful engagement among persons living with dementia. Dementia, 22(4), 854-874. https://doi.org/10.1177/14713012231162713
- Bender, A. A., Kemp, C. L., Vandenberg, A. E., Burgess, E. O., & Perkins, M. M. (2022). “You gotta have your cry”: Administrator and direct care worker experiences of death in assisted living. Journal of Aging Studies, 63.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaging.2022.101072
- Burgess, E. O., Kemp, C. L., & Bender, A. A. (2022). “It’s going to be different for everybody”: Negotiating quality of life and care priorities within care convoys. Journal of Aging and Health, 34(4-5), 602-613. https://doi.org/10.1177/08982643211052367
- Fitzroy, A. F., Kemp, C. L., & Burgess, E. O. (2022). "I'm not terribly lonely": Advancing the understanding of intimacy among older adults. Journal of Aging Studies, 61. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaging.2022.101005
- Kemp, C. L., Lesandrini, J., Morgan, J. C., & Burgess, E. O. (2022). The ethics in long-term care model: Everyday ethics and the unseen moral landscape of assisted living. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 41(4), 1143-1152. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F07334648211049806
- Ciofi, J. M., Kemp, C. L., & Bender, A. A. (2022). Assisted living residents with dementia: Being out in the world and negotiating connections. The Gerontologist. 62(2), 200–211, https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gnab113
- Kemp, C. L., Bender, A. A., Ciofi, J., Morgan, J. C., Burgess, E. O., Duong, S., Epps, F. R., Hill, A. H., Manley, P. R., Sease, J., & Perkins, M. M. (2021) Meaningful engagement among assisted living residents with dementia: Successful approaches. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 40(12), 1751-1757. https://doi.org/10.1177/0733464821996866