UC Berkeley

As part of a larger research undertaking which explores the overall life-experience of former mental hospital patients living in community-based sheltered-care facilities in California, predictors of resident social involvement - both within the facility and outside in the community at large - were delineated. In our sample of 499 residents, we found that the types of variables indicating higher levels of social integration differed between male and female residents. The predictors that were most significant for men tended to indicate a coping style based upon access to community resources and feasibility of becoming socially involved. Thus, the opportunities made available to men in sheltered-care facilities tended to be taken advantage of provided the residents' psychological handicap was not too debilitating. Predictors of higher levels of social involvement for women residents on the other hand, involved the acceptability of such behavior as appropriate by the community and the facility operator. Women residents thus appeared to be more sensitive to social, rather than environmental contingencies.