| Budget Amount *help |
¥2,100,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,100,000)
Fiscal Year 2003: ¥900,000 (Direct Cost: ¥900,000)
Fiscal Year 2002: ¥1,200,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,200,000)
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| Research Abstract |
Mutual-type action research was conducted over a 20-month period from May 2002 to February 2004 in collaboration with caregivers and users/survivors of the work activity center in a city. The study attempted to ascertain ways for the center to assist schizophrenic disabilities of the socially active, as a means of improving social life including employment, and for reducing social isolation or anti-inclusion. Each day, about 16 users/survivors use the enter, and most have schizophrenia, while a few have Asperger Syndrome and Borderline Personality Disorder etc. Before the research, caregivers viewed the center as a place for user/survivors to spend their day without stress, and interacted with users/survivors to prevent recurrence and stabilize symptoms. Therefore, users/survivors were excessively dependent on caregivers and spent most of the day in an idle manner.
The work activity center thus lacked change, and caregivers were feeling a little strange about this. The researchers compo
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sed at five members : 2 researchers, the center director, and 2 caregivers who actually interact with users/survivors. Action research was combined with participation observation, supervision by case conference, study groups, and reference learning.
Recovery was positioned as a methodological concept for users/survivors interaction.
The 20-month action-reflection spiral resulted in the following 8 practical outcomes : 1)crisis intervention for prevention of recurrence ; 2)shared findings associated with recovery among caregivers, and organization of case records and daily logs ; 3)shared recovery processes from users/survivors narratives ; 4)establishment of support techniques based on the life views of caregivers ; 5)shared significance of setting goals for users/survivors within the framework of social norms ; 6)improved occupational ethics for caregivers ; 7)introduction of group work ; 8)identification of cases requiring long-term intervention.
Subsequently, the users/survivors were empowered because they began to have more realistic and subjective self-images, and caregivers were empowered because they identified internal discrimination among caregivers, based on lower wages and unfair social assessment. Less
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