| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立臺灣大學 === 社會工作學研究所 === 101 === Keeping the track of providing on-site support through developing “natural supports” at workplace is the important task of supported employment service in Taiwan. In recent years, there are plenty of researches on natural supports which focus on the subjective experience of service users. However, the process of providing natural supports and the role of employment service worker and natural supporter need be presented in this research. It is expected that this research will discover the process and content of providing natural supports from supported employment service.
This research is a match pair study which explores natural supports in supportive employment services for persons with mental disabilities from the perspectives of the service users, their colleagues/employers and employment service workers. In this research, five service users, six natural supporters and four employment service workers are being studied through the method of individual depth interview and the strategy of triangulation.
As the research reveals, there are requirements including co-working opportunity and authority of office to develop natural supports. Employment service workers recognize potential natural supporters on job site, and they use strategies to facilitate the interaction between natural supporters and service users to promote natural supports. The contents of natural supports contain instrumental support(job training, flexible working hours and job accommodation) and emotional support(social interactions, identification and sense of belonging). Employers as natural supporters work as demonstrators and coordinators due to authority of office and responsibility. Colleagues as natural supporters provide friendship through social activities and generalizing the experience of service users. Natural supports are the crucial factor to maintain the employment stability of persons with mental illness. According to the above findings and conclusions, the following discussions are recent strategy of developing natural supports, the feasibility of institutionalizing natural supports, workplace as a bridge of advocacy and the introspection of researcher.
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