No evidence that implicit identification with mental illness predicts recovery

Objectives: Recovery from mental illness is multiply-determined, but one factor that has been proposed to influence recovery is the degree to which the person identifies as someone with a mental illness. This study examines the relationship between implicit identification with being mentally unwell and recovery among clients of a community mental health service. A multi-faceted view of recovery was adopted. Methods: A longitudinal design was used to assess implicit identification with mental illness and its relationship to recovery, including symptom severity, well-being, life satisfaction, and optimism, which were supplemented with ratings by both support workers and the research assistants who conducted the study. Participants were 216 community mental health care clients, with 150 retested at Time 2, and 100 retested at Time 3. Results: Implicit identification with mental illness was correlated with recovery at Time 1 and Time 3, though this relationship did not emerge at Time 2. Cross-lag regression analyses failed to reveal evidence that implicit identification with mental illness predicts subsequent recovery. Conclusions: The current research suggests that implicit identification with mental illness can be considered a marker of ongoing recovery, but is not predictive of subsequent recovery. Hence, these data suggest that implicit identification with mental illness is unlikely to play an independent role in the recovery process. Practitioner points: Research regarding the mental health consequences of implicit identification focuses on symptomatology. Recovery is more than a reduction in symptoms, however, and thus, a broader conceptualization of recovery was examined. Implicit identification with being mentally unwell was associated with poorer recovery broadly operationalized, but did not predict subsequent recovery.