The participants were 16 (1 male, 15 female) elders. The number of elderly people was 5 people at 70 years, 9 people at 80 years, 2 people at 90 years. They were users at nursing homes with Long-Time Care Required 1 level or 2 level in Japanese care system. Inclusion criteria were 1) elders could understand the instruction of cosmetic therapy, 2) they could communicate with others. Exclusion criteria was that elders had serious depression from the facilities’ adjustment. Half of them needed help to move. Two people had hearing problems and helpers attended. Two elders needed help to understand question items.

The therapist was certified by Shiseido company with training. Tie cosmetic therapy included the following program. 1) Explanation about expected effects cosmetic therapy both on physical and mental aspects for about 5 minutes, 2) Relaxation including stretch for about 5 minutes, 3) Skin care using all in one gel and massage of face stimulating parotid gland or submandibular gland for about 10 minutes, stimulating face skin, 4) and Make up using eyebrow, lipstick, and cheek about 10 minutes. The instructor often talked with elders warmly. After makeup, elders looked themselves with mirror. They completed informed consent and questionnaire pre and post. Staffs took pictures pre and post. So it was 60 minutes totally.

We used the following questionnaires.

1) Mood, Satisfaction, and Confidence item from the STAI (State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, [8]) which measure anxiety from 1 to 4. The STAI was used in a previous study for elders ([11]). The high score shows high anxiety. The STAI constructed two factors like state anxiety and trait anxiety for 20 items. We used the trait anxiety to measure changes by one cosmetic therapy. We chose 3 items like Mood, Satisfaction, and Confidence, because [13] used these items.

2) The subjective health feeling from 1 to 4. We referred to [4]. And we chose items which get highest scores. The reliability of 4 items was α = 0.91.

3) The psychological well-being from cosmetic therapy. We referred to [12]. She measured psychological state using 11 question items like mood, or motivation. We chose 4 items which showed significance.

We recruited participants through facilities for elderly two nursing homes. The cosmetic therapy was one time session. Duration of the session was about 60 minutes. They answer the questionnaire before and after the therapy. Also, researchers took pictures of participants, and planned to report in another occasion.

We conducted the basic statistics and conducted the paired t-test between pre and post, and correlation coefficient analysis.

We performed this study in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. This study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Nisikyusyu University (25AVX22).

Cosmetic therapy improved Mood and Satisfaction of anxiety in STAI. Since they challenged for themselves and became beautiful faces, they felt good mood and satisfaction. [12] showed that cometic therapy decrease STAI score for healthy young women, we can add the new fact that cosmetic therapy improves mood and satisfaction for elders.

About the Confidence score, although it did not change, it is because of session time. It is only one time session. If we increase session times, the Confidence score may increase.

About Subjective Health Feelings scores, [4] showed increased the score for elders in living in community after 3 months intervention. Participants in this study were in nursing homes or day care center because of their physical impaired or low cognitive function. So only one session did not change.

About Motivation, motivation significantly increased. It is because putting on makeup might have power to motivate elders to do self-care and they were glad to see their beautiful face making up, and they communicate with each other, staffs, or the instructors. There are very few studies to show evidence about motivation of elders. [12] showed evidence for young women. Art therapy expresses people’s feelings to other things like drawing paper or collage paper. However, cosmetic therapy expresses their feelings to their face to become beautiful. Cosme therapy might irritate humans’ aesthetics and elders’ motivation increased. It is like [9] who showed psychological effects after putting on makeup. However, irritation of aesthetics in this study is process of it.

Moreover, in future, we did not assess cognitive function. Tanida showed the effects of cosmetic therapy on cognitive function and verbal fluency, we need to investigate both cognitive function and well-being.

Motivation correlated with Waking up, Comfort, and Vigor. Waking up correlated with Comfort and Vigor, and Comfort correlated with Vigor. Skin care with cosmetic might wake up elders’ sense of skin and its sense affect comfort or vigor. These are interaction between physical and mental aspect. Also, these correlation support [9] in which skin care, makeup, and fragrance affect the mind and body through tactile, visual and olfactory sensation. [7] showed that the impact of skin aging may extends beyond physical health, potentially affecting social interactions and self-esteem.

[1] showed that recent advancements in cosmetic science signal a pivotal shift from a narrow emphasis on external esthetics to a more holistic approach that embraces both internal and external well-being. The correlation with factors in the present study may results in interrelationships physical and mental like [1].

[2] showed that the global increase in the aging population has therefore driven a demand for effective anti-aging strategies, leading to extensive research in this field. Cosmetic therapy may useful for future.

As limitation, we did not establish a control group. So, the effect of cosmetic therapy in this therapy is not really validated. And, the number of participants were small and we need include much more participants. Moreover, we did not measure cognitive function using standard measure like Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE). In future, we need to assess cognitive function to clear participants’ characteristics.