Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness

Purpose – The lived experience of individuals who experience mental illness should be at the heart of recovery-orientated practice and research. The purpose of this paper is to outline key ethical and practical issues that both respect principles of recovery and are fundamental to establishing and m...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Milbourn, B., McNamara, Beverley, Buchanan, Angus
Format: Journal Article
Published: Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. 2015
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17213
_version_ 1848749402944962560
author Milbourn, B.
McNamara, Beverley
Buchanan, Angus
author_facet Milbourn, B.
McNamara, Beverley
Buchanan, Angus
author_sort Milbourn, B.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Purpose – The lived experience of individuals who experience mental illness should be at the heart of recovery-orientated practice and research. The purpose of this paper is to outline key ethical and practical issues that both respect principles of recovery and are fundamental to establishing and maintaining a research relationship with people with severe mental illness (SMI). Design/methodology/approach – Theoretical frameworks of recovery, discourse ethics and critical reflexivity were used in a 12-month longitudinal community study to construct and build methodology to inform the collection of rich descriptive data through informal discussions, observations and interviews. Detailed field notes and a reflective journal were used to enable critical reflexivity and challenge normative assumptions based on clinical and lay views of SMI. Findings – The paper provides an analysis through three vignettes which demonstrate how the principles of recovery were incorporated in an ethically grounded research relationship. Research limitations/implications – The study may have been limited by the small sample size of participants. Practical implications – Aspects of the research methodology may potentially be adopted by researchers working with people who experience SMI or with other hard-to-reach groups. Originality/value – As more research is undertaken with individuals who experience SMI, stigma around understandings of mental illness can be broken down by supporting individuals to find their voice through recovery orientated discourse ethics.
first_indexed 2025-11-14T07:20:22Z
format Journal Article
id curtin-20.500.11937-17213
institution Curtin University Malaysia
institution_category Local University
last_indexed 2025-11-14T07:20:22Z
publishDate 2015
publisher Emerald Group Publishing Ltd.
recordtype eprints
repository_type Digital Repository
spelling curtin-20.500.11937-172132017-09-13T15:44:35Z Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness Milbourn, B. McNamara, Beverley Buchanan, Angus Purpose – The lived experience of individuals who experience mental illness should be at the heart of recovery-orientated practice and research. The purpose of this paper is to outline key ethical and practical issues that both respect principles of recovery and are fundamental to establishing and maintaining a research relationship with people with severe mental illness (SMI). Design/methodology/approach – Theoretical frameworks of recovery, discourse ethics and critical reflexivity were used in a 12-month longitudinal community study to construct and build methodology to inform the collection of rich descriptive data through informal discussions, observations and interviews. Detailed field notes and a reflective journal were used to enable critical reflexivity and challenge normative assumptions based on clinical and lay views of SMI. Findings – The paper provides an analysis through three vignettes which demonstrate how the principles of recovery were incorporated in an ethically grounded research relationship. Research limitations/implications – The study may have been limited by the small sample size of participants. Practical implications – Aspects of the research methodology may potentially be adopted by researchers working with people who experience SMI or with other hard-to-reach groups. Originality/value – As more research is undertaken with individuals who experience SMI, stigma around understandings of mental illness can be broken down by supporting individuals to find their voice through recovery orientated discourse ethics. 2015 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17213 10.1108/QRJ-12-2013-0071 Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. restricted
spellingShingle Milbourn, B.
McNamara, Beverley
Buchanan, Angus
Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title_full Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title_fullStr Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title_full_unstemmed Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title_short Respecting recovery: Research relationships with people with mental illness
title_sort respecting recovery: research relationships with people with mental illness
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17213