How Family Factors Impact Psychosocial Functioning for African American Consumers with Schizophrenia

Abstract

There is a critical need to test how family contextual factors impact outpatient consumer functioning in schizophrenia. This is the first study of two companion studies reported here that tests family factors' influence on consumer functioning. Ninety-three low income inner-city African American consumer-family dyads were tested to see the possible impact of family factors, based on the EE and family caregiver burden literatures, on consumer psychosocial functioning (work, social, and independent living). The results supported a model wherein greater amounts of family contact had a significant relationship with better consumer psychosocial functioning. Additionally, family dysfunction had a direct negative relationship to consumer psychosocial functioning while family pressures and resources had an indirect negative relationship to consumer psychosocial functioning. Results are in marked contrast to what impacted consumer clinical functioning for the same sample. The findings appear to confirm that family factors differently impact the domains of clinical and psychosocial functioning. These findings are new for understanding the contextual factors that impact consumer functioning, especially psychosocial functioning.

Quality of Life and Competitive Work Among Adults With Severe Mental Illness: Moderating Effects of Family Contact

“…Because the analyses statistically controlled for satisfaction with family relations and severity of psychiatric symptoms, it can plausibly be inferred that the positive relationship between global quality of life and competitive work for participants who saw family members frequently might be attributable to family dynamics other than simple mutual likeability or tolerance of psychiatric symptoms. Cultural theories suggest that the observed findings for this predominantly rural, African-American sample may reflect family acceptance of and responsibility for adults with severe mental illness and a corresponding appreciation of their work achievements (10,11). Research is needed to identify family responses to competitive employment (for example, praise, stigma reduction, and lower financial burden) that might account for the higher global quality of life among competitively employed participants who saw family members frequently.…”

“…This self-report measure of family contact is considered to be a behavioral indicator of the subjective cultural concept of familism (24). Similar measures have been used for this purpose in other studies of African-American individuals with severe mental illness (10,11).…”

The Importance of Consumer Perceived Criticism on Clinical Outcomes for Outpatient African Americans with Schizophrenia

“…The advantages of SEM for modeling these data were addressed in the companion manuscript (Guada et al 2010).…”

“…As this was the same sample as used in the companion article (Guada et al 2010) please refer to more specific information about the sample there. In brief, the total sample was 94 African-American dyads (consumer and family member) who were interviewed at baseline before services began.…”

“…The family member representative responded to this scale. The psychometric properties for the scale were addressed in the companion manuscript (Guada et al 2010).…”