This study was made to examine what the Fountain house can do to help their members and how the members feel about their situation and their ability to participate in their rehabilitation. To do so we contacted one of the Fountain houses in Sweden, located in Falkenberg, to get a better view of what their members thought about the process. Our main purpose with this study was to turn the spotlight on what the Fountain house organization means to its members. To do so we had two main questions that we wanted to examine more closely:  How do the members experience the Fountain house organization?  To which extend do the members feel that they are allowed to participate in their rehabilitation?  How much influence do the members feel that they have? For this study we choose to use the qualitative method which included a lot of literature research, observations and interviews with members of the Fountain house organization. Our study also included looking at other researchers work and how they choose to approach their interview participates. We did this to get a grip on how we could structure our own interviews to work out for the best. The main result of our study was that no matter what your reason for joining a Fountain house may be, the result of your membership will keep you feeling better about yourself in a way that makes you more available to accept the fact that you can do whatever you set your mind to.

Studiens syfte var att undersöka hur medlemmar och handledare på Fontänhuset i Örebro såg på handledarnas roll i klubbhuset. För att uppnå syftet användes en kvalitativ metod i form av halvstrukturerade intervjuer. Urvalet bestod av sex personer, varav tre medlemmar och tre handledare från Örebro Fontänhus. Studien visade att handledarna uppfattades ha två övergripande roller. Den ena handlade om att inspirera medlemmarna till personlig utveckling, deltagande i klubbhusverksamheten och ut till arbetslivet, samt om att förmedla vikten av deltagande. Den andra gick ut på att stödja medlemmarna på olika sätt. Stödfunktionen inbegrep bidrag till klubbhusets sociala gemenskap, deltagande i dess sociala program, kontaktmannaskap för boenden i dess boendeprogram samt hjälp till medlemmar i deras kontakter med samhället. En arbetsuppgift var att bekämpa omgivningens stigma. Det ansågs nödvändigt att handledaren kunde arbeta på ett på ett flexibelt sätt. Handledaren hade ett huvudansvar för klubbhusverksamheten, där hon skulle bidra med trygghet och kontinuitet. Hon gavs även en ledarroll som handlade om att strukturera och fördela arbetsuppgifter. Gentemot medlemmen betraktades handledaren vara jämlik, men ändock professionell.

<p>The aim of this undergraduate thesis was to study what the participation in the activities of the Fontain House in Stockholm means to its members. The research questions dealt with how the members describe their participation in the activities, whether they say that it has helped them, and, in that case, in which way. Furthermore, they dealt with how the members argue about their experiences of mental illness and of social help. The study was carried out within the framework of the narrative method. As tools for analyzing the narratives, parts of An-tonovsky’s theories as well as the theoretical concepts of inclusion and exclusion as described by Madsen, were used. Furthermore, earlier research on the Fontain House was applied in the analysis. The results of the study showed that all of the respondents said that the Fontain House was of great importance in their lives and that they could participate in its activities in regard to their own needs and resources. The thesis discusses whether the selection and the execution of the study may have affected the results toward a positive tendency. Concerning how the re-spondents argue about mental illness and about social help, the answers varied strongly.</p>

The aim of this undergraduate thesis was to study what the participation in the activities of the Fontain House in Stockholm means to its members. The research questions dealt with how the members describe their participation in the activities, whether they say that it has helped them, and, in that case, in which way. Furthermore, they dealt with how the members argue about their experiences of mental illness and of social help. The study was carried out within the framework of the narrative method. As tools for analyzing the narratives, parts of An-tonovsky’s theories as well as the theoretical concepts of inclusion and exclusion as described by Madsen, were used. Furthermore, earlier research on the Fontain House was applied in the analysis. The results of the study showed that all of the respondents said that the Fontain House was of great importance in their lives and that they could participate in its activities in regard to their own needs and resources. The thesis discusses whether the selection and the execution of the study may have affected the results toward a positive tendency. Concerning how the re-spondents argue about mental illness and about social help, the answers varied strongly.

Psykisk ohälsa är ett begrepp som vi människor ofta kommer i kontakt med i vårat dagliga liv. I Sverige är många människor sjukskrivna med just psykisk ohälsa och syftet med vår studie är att undersöka hur attityder och stigmatisering av dessa individer ser ut bland organisationerna. Detta är en kvalitativ studie där intervjuer skett med fem olika organisationer som på ett eller annat sätt kommer i kontakt med psykisk ohälsa. För att begränsa vårat arbete har vi valt att använda oss av tre begrepp: psykiska besvär, psykiatriska funktionshinder, och psykossjukdomar. Teorier som används för att analysera vårat resultat är Erving Goffmans stigmateori och Thomas, J. Scheffs teori kring primär och sekundär stämpling och ”the sick role”. Vidare har vi använt den kvalitativa forskningsmetoden och utfört en kvalitativ intervju med semistrukturerade frågor. Genom semistrukturerade frågor har vi fått utrymme att ställa uppföljningsfrågor och informanterna har kunnat svara mer fritt. Den insamlade empirin bearbetades i en tematisk analys med förutbestämda teman. Resultatet visar att de fem organisationer som intervjuats i studien har liknande erfarenheter kring stigmatiserade attityder mot de tre grupperna. Det framkommer att personer som lider av psykossjukdomar stigmatiseras oftare än personer som har lättare psykiska besvär. Resultatet visar också att organisationerna menar att det blir svårare att komma tillbaka till en vardag med arbete och sociala relationer ju mer en människa har stigmatiserats av omgivning och samhälle. / Mental illness is a term that we come in contact with in our daily life. In Sweden, a lot of people are on sick leave due to mental illness and the focus of our study is to research how the attitudes and stigma look like for these individuals inside of the organizations. This is a qualitative study where five different organizations have come in contact with mental illness. To limit our work we have chosen to use three terms that follows mental illness: psychiatrics, functionality, and psychosis. Theories that has been used to analyze our results is Erving Goffman’s stigma and Thomas, J. Scheff’s theory around primary and secondary labeling, as well as “the sick role”. Furthermore we have used the qualitative research method and performed a qualitative interview with semi-structured questions. Through the semi-structured questions we managed to get space to ask follow-up questions and the informants were able to answer more freely. The collected empirical research was processed in a thematic analysis with predetermined themes. The results shows that the five organizations that were interviewed in the study have similar experiences around stigmatized attitudes toward the three groups. It appears that people who suffer from psychosis are stigmatized more often than people with lighter mental issues. The results also shows that the organizations wants to tell us that it will get harder to find the way back to a life with social relations and work the more a person has been stigmatized due to surroundings and society.