Grant: Operating Grant

More than 80% of individuals with a severe mental illness such as schizophrenia wish to work in regular competitive jobs. Even the best vocational programs --such as those following the supported employment model-- only find employment for approximately 50% of participants, with many losing their jobs after a few months. Of the reasons found to explain these results, inappropriate expectancies, poor coping strategies as well as erroneous beliefs about the workplace or their own work abilities are often mentioned. The current proposal wishes to offer a tailored group intervention to 50 individuals with severe mental illness engaged in a supported employment program and compare their work outcomes over one year to those of 50 other participants enrolled in the same vocational program but not receiving the group intervention. The group intervention will specifically target expectancies, beliefs and coping strategies related to work. The study will also measure the contribution of other factors that can impede successful work integration, such as financial disincentives, symptoms, the presence of other mental disorders or of cognitive deficits and social interaction deficits. Such an intervention could potentially improve work integration of individuals with severe mental illness at a fairly low cost.