Recent Projects

Exploratory study of the relationship between sustained employment and psychosocial adjustment of people with psychiatric disabilities

Zlatka Russinova, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
zlatka@bu.edu | see profile

Nancy Wewiorski, Ph.D.
Project Director

Project Mission

The objective of this study was to explore the relationship between successful employment of people with psychiatric disabilities and their overall level of psychosocial adjustment.

Project Goals

Goal I
To gather information about the capacity for people with psychiatric disabilities to sustain competitive employment; about the patterns and types of competitive employment maintained; about the factors related to successful employment, including supports, disclosure, job satisfaction, work motivation, reasonable accommodations, and coping strategies used at the work place.

Goal II
To study the quality of life of successfully employed mental health consumers.

Goal III
To examine the level of empowerment of mental health consumers who have sustained competitive employment.

Goal IV
To explore the level of social connectedness of successfully employed consumers, including relationships with family and friends, and reliance on a broader social support system.

Goal V
To study the changes occurring over a two-year period of time in the vocational and psychosocial functioning of consumers who have sustained competitive employment.

Expanding the Longitudinal Study

Funds through the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center for Rehabilitation of Persons with Long-Term Mental Illness awarded by National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) to the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation in October 1999 were obtained for continuing this longitudinal study for an additional three years of follow-up of the respondents who enrolled at baseline. In this way, this study was expanded into a 5-year longitudinal study that will provide consistent information about a phenomenon that has not been studied systematically in the field of psychiatric rehabilitation.

Summary of Findings From Baseline Assessment

firg-baseline.pdf firg-baseline.txt

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Related Article

For additional information regarding this study, please contact the Principle Investigator, Zlatka Russinova, Ph.D.; zlatka@bu.edu.

This project is supported by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) within the Department of Education.