Mental health professionals' social constructions of families of people with serious mental illness

In contrast to historical pathogenic social constructions of families as bad/immoral people and causal agents, recent mental health practice literature portrays families as co-victims of a the mental illness, and as strong partners/allies within a collaborative consumer treatment team. Despite family members' claims that living with a relative's mental illness is a significant life challenge that may affect as many as 22 million Americans, as well as strong empirical evidence of the treatment efficacy of family psychoeducation, little is known about the actual social constructions of families, as reported by current mental health professionals.;A convenience sample of community mental health professionals participated in a survey (n = 73), and four follow up focus groups (n = 37), that assessed their social constructions of, and reported interactions with, families of people with serious mental illness. Drawn from an integration of social construction and labeling theories, hypothesis one predicted that mental health professionals who reported higher rates of agreement with family pathogenesis social constructions, would be likely to report less family contact time. Hypothesis two predicted that mental health professionals who reported higher rates of agreement with family pathogenesis social constructions, would be likely to report lower activity levels with families.;The mental health professionals most frequently reported social constructions of family members of people with serious mental illness as: (1) pathogenic, e.g., unsupportive agitators; and (2) co-victims of the mental illness, e.g., overburdened caregivers, copers, and grievers.;In addition, mental health professionals reported social constructions of family members as uninformed people, e.g., people in need of information about mental illness and mental health treatment. The professionals were largely unaware of positive social constructions of family members. The respondents reported overall low levels of family contact time and activity levels.;There was not evidence to confirm either of the two hypotheses. Statistically significant predictors of family contact time were: (1) serving child consumers and (2) consumer contact time.;Recommendations included further research; scale development; building/testing family involvement models; implementation of family psychoeducation programs; training of mental health professionals; and increased teamwork among consumers, mental health professionals, and family members in practice and policy.