Conceptualization and Experience of Expressed Emotion among People with Schizophrenia and their Caregivers; Qualitative Study
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Date
2024-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
BACKGROUND- Schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder are psychotic disorders and severe mental illnesses manifested by positive and negative symptoms. High expressed emotion, which comprised of criticism, emotional oveinvolvement and hostility of care givers towards people with those mental illnesses has been implicated as a reason for frequent relapse.
OBJECTIVE- to explore conceptualization and Experience of expressed emotion among people with severe mental health condition and their caregivers at Amanuel mental specialized hospital Sitota center for mental health care and rehabilitation and.
METHOD- qualitative study was conducted among 16 participants; eight were from Amanuel Mental Specialized Hospital and others from Sitota center for mental health care and rehabilitation. Half of them were people with severe mental health condition and the remaining eight were caregivers. After in-depth interview conducted and audiotaped the primary author repeatedly listened the interviews and made the transcription and translation. As the conceptualization was mainly related with the well-established conceptualization of expressed emotion, the analysis was guided by established frameworks specially related to expressed emotion and while still being open to any new themes that emerged.
RESULT- Six themes were identified; Quality of relationship, hostility; criticism; overinvolvement; warmth and positive regards and coping strategies. Caregivers consider people with SMHC they are caring for are lazy, dependent, lack confidence, and they lack motivation. They also show their criticism and hostility in different circumstances. Participants reported overinvolvement is beyond EOI, and they have justifications for that. People with SMHC also reported different coping strategies, like keeping quiet, decrease level of contact and so on
CONCLUSION- the way people conceptualize expressed emotion matches what previous research has shown. Caregiver‟s experience of high expressed emotion correlates with the way they understand the symptoms, their understanding of the illness in general. With this, it will be important to raise awareness about the negative impact of high expressed emotion and develop and evaluate interventions to address these issues as the care givers did not understand the impact of their action possibly by incorporating family psychoeducation plan as a part management.
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CONCEPTUALIZATION AND EXPERIENCE OF EXPRESSED