The relationship between well-being, future planning and intentions to utilise intervention programmes: what can be learned from homeless service users?

There has been an increasing interest in the impact of individual well-being on the attitudes and actions of people receiving services designed to offer support. If well-being factors are important in the uptake and success of service programmes it is important that the nature of the relationships involved is understood by service designers and implementers. As a contribution to understanding, this paper examines the impact of well-being on the uptake of intervention programmes for homeless people. From the literature on well-being a number of factors are identified that contribute towards overall well-being, which include personal efficacy and identity, but also more directly well-being can be viewed as personal or group/collective esteem. The impact of these factors on service use is assessed by means of two studies of homelessness service users, comparing the implementation of two research tools: a shortened and a fuller one. The conclusions are that the factors identified are related to service use. The higher the collective esteem – esteem drawn from identification with services and their users and providers – and the less that they feel isolated, the more benefits that homeless people will perceive with service use, and in turn the more likely they are to be motivated to use services. However, the most important factors in explaining service use are a real sense that it is appropriate to accept social support from others, a rejection of the social identity as homeless but a cultivation of being valued as part of a non-homeless community, and a positive perception of the impact of the service.

Exploring homeless people’s use of outreach services: applying a social psychological perspective

A number of critiques have been published drawing attention to the gaps in research methods applied to issues surrounding homelessness and service utilisation in Britain. This paper discusses the use of social identity, a theory drawn from the field of applied social psychology, and synthesises it with the pathways model, thereby providing a framework to further explore service utilisation. The synthesised framework was used to predict the uptake of outreach services in a prospective study of 121 homeless people in a major UK city. In general, homeless people's use of intervention services was affected by the extent to which they identified with the support services themselves. The study demonstrates the central role of social identity in understanding service utilisation patterns, and shows the importance of applying fresh techniques to fine-tune our understanding of uptake in the long term.

The role of efficacy and well-being in guiding the use of education and training services by young homeless mothers

This paper builds on previous work applying the concept of well-being to the field of housing. It uses the concepts of self-esteem, efficacy and social identity to explore the situations of a group of young homeless mothers. In particular, it focuses on the impact of well-being factors, among others, in understanding the uptake of education and training services. The paper concludes by arguing that well-being issues are crucial for housing agencies and others who want to engage with young homeless people.

A follow-up study of characteristics of young people that dropout and continue psychotherapy: service implications for a clinic in the community

Background: The paper reports the findings from a follow-up study of the factors that contribute to whether young people dropout or continue once-weekly psychotherapy at a voluntary sector psychotherapy service for young people aged 12 to 21 years. Method: The study uses data from an ongoing audit of the psychotherapy service that started in 1993; 882 young people were included in the study. Premature termination of treatment was defined as dropping out before the 21st session. Continuation in treatment was defined as remaining in therapy after 20 sessions. Measures and areas of interest used in the study include diagnostic measures, the Youth Self Report Form and Young Adult Self Report Form, demographic characteristics and treatment related information. Results: Young people who continued in treatment were more likely to be older, have anxieties about sexual and relationship issues and have higher scores on self-reported anxiety-depression. Young people who dropped out of treatment were more likely to be younger, have higher self-reported delinquency scores, have a diagnosis of hyperactivity-conduct disorder and be homeless. Conclusions: The study of treatment termination has demonstrated the value of service audit and has led to a significant change in clinical practice.