PS 1997; 48:347-352
Copyright © 1997 by American Psychiatric Association
Considerations for research on consumer empowerment and psychosocial interventions
PW Corrigan and AN Garman
University of Chicago, IL, USA.
Consumer empowerment is a political movement that, among many goals, seeks
to diminish the stigma and discrimination experienced by people with severe
and persistent psychiatric disorders. This paper reviews research
strategies that address the methodological problems of studying consumer
empowerment. Key issues include defining the subject of investigation,
describing consumer-developed treatments using discovery-oriented research
strategies, and sorting out the diverse roles of consumers in contemporary
psychosocial programs. Consumer empowerment introduces a political paradigm
into the understanding of severe mental illness, a paradigm that can be
difficult to integrate with the goals of empirical research.
