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Consumer-operated self-help centers were designed to provide social environments that promote participant empowerment and satisfaction. This exploratory, descriptive study examined how variance in empowerment and satisfaction scores could be explained by participants' perceptions of the social environment factors (relationship, personal growth, and systems maintenance and change) and quantity of participation. Participants (N = 144) involved in consumer-operated self-help centers completed a four-part, 161-item survey designed to capture perceptions of satisfaction, empowerment, social environment factors, quantity of center participation, and demographic data. Significant relationships were found between participant satisfaction and the three social environment factors. Findings also indicated that participant empowerment was related to quantity of self-help center involvement. From these exploratory analyses, recommendations are made on how to improve consumer-run self-help center operations.

Readiness in the work domain has been a controversial issue for the psychiatric rehabilitation community. Judgments of a lack of readiness have relegated many persons to lives of continued unemployment and service dependency. Conversely, proponents of the rapid placement strategy of supported employment have down-played the importance of readiness. Yet, a careful review of the supported employment research suggests that readiness may indeed be an important factor in vocational outcomes. This paper presents evidence that the screening criteria employed in SE studies are often related to readiness factors and that these criteria are highly predictive of vocational outcomes. Acceptance of the importance of readiness for success in the vocational arena implies new service strategies and may serve to improve vocational outcomes in general.

Aging persons with serious mental illness present unique challenges for community mental health services. This population is increasing in numbers in mental health treatment settings. The combination of serious mental illness with the vicissitudes of aging suggest that a broader conceptualization of this population may improve services. SAMHSA's 8 Dimension of Wellness offers a comprehensive strengths-based framework for interventions to maximize older persons' abilities and address the complex bidirectional effects of physical, emotional, social, spiritual, occupational, financial, intellectual, and environmental challenges to wellness. This systemic literature review identifies unidimensional and multidimensional wellness interventions for older adults with mental illness. Method: We conducted a systematic literature review to identify wellness interventions provided to persons with serious mental illness with a mean age of 45 or higher. Results: Twenty-six articles representing 14 distinct wellness interventions were identified. None of the articles used SAMHSA's 8 Dimensions of Wellness framework. The physical wellness (n ϭ 21) and social (n ϭ 15) dimensions were the most frequently described in the literature. There was no mention of either the intellectual or spiritual dimensions. The quality of the research of these interventions varied; 14 papers described a randomized controlled trial. Conclusions: The SAMHSA wellness framework has not been used to design interventions for older persons with serious mental illness. Interventions for aging persons should support comprehensive wellness, including the intellectual and spiritual domains. Impact and ImplicationsThis work has suggested the need for the development of a unified research agenda to systematically build knowledge of needs, preferences, and effective interventions to improve the state of the science, practices and ultimately outcomes used in helping older persons with serious mental illness continue to achieve recovery and community integration.

PWC is potentially a promising practice for helping people choose and pursue individual goals and facilitating positive health and wellness changes. Rigorous controlled research with larger samples is needed to evaluate the benefits of peer delivered wellness coaching. (PsycINFO Database Record

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Human Capital Theory posits that investment in education and job training increase employability among the general labor force. This study examined the applicability of Human Capital Theory to an explanation of employment outcomes of individuals with psychiatric illness. The employment rates of participants with mental illness and participants with equivalent human capital but not disability were compared. The study also explored whether human capital variables predicted employability. The study found that participants with mental illness achieved similar re-employment rates within six-months of becoming unemployed when compared to their counterparts with no reported disability. Additionally, later onset of mental illness predicted higher employment rates. Severity of psychiatric symptoms was not predictive of employment rates.These findings suggest that human capital variables are correlated with employment outcomes among persons with mental illness. They also suggest that assisting mental health consumers in the pursuit of education and job training may improve their employability which can lead to financial independence and community integration. The findings also support the development and implementation of Supported Education to assist consumers to succeed in education and job training.