Social science research on self-help/mutual aid groups and organizations from 1960 on is reviewed. Voluntary peer-run mutually supportive groups’ diversity illustrated through Alcoholics Anonymous, mental health groups and others. Socio-political contexts shape self-help/mutual aid. Borkman’s autoethnographic narrative highlights her participation.

Previously published under title: Authoritative guide to self-help resources in mental health.

The third edition of Psychiatric Rehabilitation, discusses interventions to help individuals with mental illness improve the quality of their life, achieve goals, and increase opportunities for community integration so they can lead full and productive lives. This person centered approach emphasizes strengths, skill development, and the attainment of valued social roles. The third edition has been fully updated with new coverage indicating how to address medical problems while treating for mental illness, wellness and recovery, evidence based practices, and directions for future research. Retaining the easy to read, engaging style, each chapter includes key terms with definitions, case studies, profiles of leaders in the field, special issues relating to treatment and ethics, and class exercises. Providing a comprehensive overview of this growing field, the book is suitable as an undergraduate or graduate textbook, as well as a reference for practitioners and academic researchers. Special Features: - Provides new coverage on comorbid medical disorders, evidence based practices, wellness and recovery, and direction for future research - Identifies controversial issues relating to treatment and ethics - Supplies case study examples to illustrate chapter points - Highlights key terms with definitions and key topics - Offers focus questions and class exercises as a teaching tool - New coverage of DSM-V diagnosis, evidence-based treatment, and daily living skills training - Retains case studies, boxed controversial issues, glossary

There were more visits to peer support/self-help groups last year, than there were visits to the offices of mental health professionals. Peer support groups have exploded in popularity, as the public and the healthcare community recognize that they provide an effective complement to formal care, and improve the chance that many participants will have better healthcare outcomes. Few peer support/self-help group leaders have more than minimal training in how to lead a group successfully. This is unfortunate, as leading a self-help group is often challenging. This pocket resource is designed to provide easy access to key information and strategies to help Peer Specialists and other lay group leaders develop and expand their group facilitation skills so they can lead healthy thriving peer support groups.

Support Groups: Current Perspectives on Theory and Practice provides a framework for understanding and examining supportive group interventions. It provides descriptions of different kinds of support groups and alerts practitioners and educators to the factors they should consider in planning, implementing, and evaluating support group services. The book also offers guidance in using innovative approaches to providing support services through computer groups and telephone groups.Human service professionals and social work educators, practitioners, and students will find these topics covered in Support Groups: evaluation of support groups a support group model guidelines for support group practice innovative use of support groups issues in support group practiceThe purpose of this book is to examine state-of-the-art support group practice. Support groups are conceived as the center of a continuum of supportive group interventions, overlapping with self-help groups at one end and treatment groups at the other. The chapters are placed within the context of the open systems model developed by the editors. This model provides a framework for understanding factors that affect support groups, for guiding intervention, and for evaluating their outcomes.

She provides practical advice and direction to professionals for working with these groups while analyzing self-help/support organizations on three different levels - in terms of the groups themselves, the groups' members, and the practitioner's interaction with the groups. In addition, this comprehensive volume discusses the most prominent representative associations as examples of different types of groups, including Alcoholics Anonymous, Recovery, Inc., National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, and the Alzheimer's Association. It also examines the rise of telephone and on-line self-help, considering the advantages, and disadvantages of this style of group interaction.