Occupational therapy philosophy asserts a positive relationship between occupation and health and aims to promote and restore health through enabling occupation. This study aimed to explore volunteerism as an occupation and its possible relationship to health and wellbeing from an occupational science perspective and to consider how this knowledge might be used to inform occupational therapy practice. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used, with a sample of 109 volunteers. The qualitative data are presented here and comprise written responses to two open-ended questions. The first asked the volunteers about their motivations to volunteer (MTVs) and the second asked the volunteers to describe their personal experiences of volunteering (PEVs). These data were analysed to identify patterns of MTVs and themes relating to the costs and benefits of volunteering to health and wellbeing. The findings revealed a range of MTVs, both altruistic and egoistic, as well as many and varied benefits of volunteering, providing some support for a positive relationship between volunteerism and health and wellbeing. Volunteering appeared to exert its positive effects predominantly on aspects of mental health by providing opportunities to increase confidence and self-esteem, gain social support, replace lost roles and feel included in community life. The pattern of benefits seemed to reflect the volunteers' motivations, suggesting that benefits to health may be mediated by the MTV; this was consistent with the occupational therapy philosophy that occupations need to be meaningful and purposeful to hold therapeutic value. The article concludes that engaging in a volunteer role has many potential benefits to health and wellbeing, particularly to aspects of mental health. This may have implications for the occupational therapy profession. For occupational therapists working with clients experiencing mental health problems, there may be some therapeutic value in enabling their clients to engage in a volunteer role. Future research with occupational therapists working in this area could establish if volunteerism has been used as a therapeutic occupation and its outcomes, thereby informing occupational therapy practice.

Citation: Gooch, P. & Living, R. (2004). The therapeutic use of videogames within secure forensic settings: a review of the literature and application to practice. The British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 67(8), This is the draft version of the paper.This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. Permanent repository link: Introduction Occupational therapy and leisureIn a newly revised definition of occupational therapy, the College of Occupational Therapists has noted:The main aim of occupational therapy is to maintain, restore or create a match, beneficial to the individual, between the abilities of the person, the demands of her/his occupations in the areas of self care, productivity and leisure, and the demands of the environment (COT 2003, p8).Within the occupational therapy literature, leisure has been regarded as a core human occupation, essential to physical and psychological wellbeing, since the beginning of occupational therapy practice (Meyer 1922, cited in Suto 1998, Farnworth 2000. One aspect of leisure -play -has for a long time been recognised as developmentally important in children: being bounded by rules and conditions, play allows the child to adapt to the external environment, to discover how to use tools to operate on the environment and to practise taking on social roles without exposure to the consequences that might threaten survival (Kielhofner and Miyake 1981). Playing games equips children with the social skills needed to adapt to the requirements of a society (Greenfield 1993).The profession has only recently, however, considered adult leisure and play seriously (Suto 1998, Lobo 1999, Farnworth 2000, Hodgson et al 2001. For older adults, playing games is accompanied by a sense of belonging, continuity and mental and physical health (Hoppes et al 2001). For younger adults, leisure promotes personal development and positive mental health outcomes and prepares the young person for the worker role (Passmore 1998). Videogames as a leisure activityIt has been suggested that, as a result of man' s increasing reliance on technology in the workplace, the focus for personal development and maintenance of self-identity and self-worth has shifted from work to leisure (Suto 1998, Iso-Ahola 1980 cited in Bryce 2001. At the same time, technology has influenced the choice of leisure occupations: the invention of photography and motion pictures, the development of private and public transport from the automobile to the aeroplane, and the advent of the television, the video, the computer, the games console and the Internet (Bryce 2001).The occupational therapy literature considers leisure along the three axes of occupation/activity, time and subjective experience (Suto 1998, Lobo 1999. However, in the emerging leisure studies literature, a fourth axis is considered: leisure spaces (Bryce 2001). Changing technologies have brought about changes not only in the types of leisure activity in which one engages but also in the Engagement in leisure pursuits that involves th...

This report presents the findings from a postal survey of five cohorts of graduates who successfully completed a 2-year accelerated problem-based postgraduate diploma in occupational therapy. The study aimed to elicit the graduates' views of how problem-based learning (PBL) had affected their professional practice 8 months after qualification. It was found that the majority of the graduates considered PBL to have equipped them well for their entry to clinical practice. Specifically, it was felt that PBL had made a positive contribution to their problem-solving and teamworking abilities and their clinical knowledge and skills. However, it was also found that some of the graduates were more sceptical about the effects of PBL. For this group, PBL was viewed as having had a limited effect on their abilities, knowledge and skills. The findings are discussed before conclusions and the implications for pre-qualification occupational therapy education are presented.

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