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As well as the everyday stresses in life, there are natural and accidental disasters with which we are all familiar. The 2011 Queensland floods, for example, directly affected many thousands, and more than 62,000 people registered to assist with the clean-up in Brisbane’s worst-affected suburbs. These volunteers and many others throughout Queensland, other states of Australia, and elsewhere offered support, compassion, encouragement, and guidance where it was needed. Support for those affected psychologically came from mental health workers co-ordinated by local and state government leaders. Whether major or minor, disasters inevitably cause direct trauma to victims, but also affect those near them. Much like an iceberg, the impacts of tragedy are clearly evident at one level, but may be less evident — yet just as traumatic — at another, “below the surface”, level. Thus, just as there is support at the visible, public level, there is also support needed at the less public, less visible level. Often this is where the supportive work of ordinary citizens takes place. The support person may be a neighbour, a relative or friend, the local hairdresser, a caring taxi-driver, or the local librarian. All of these and others, whether knowingly or just instinctively, may have provided Mental Health Social Support to people who require it. Perhaps you have found yourself in a situation among distressed people where you are asked to provide help, or you may see that help is needed, but you are not quite sure how to offer it. Yet you know that to do nothing is not an option, so you pitch in and do your best to provide comfort until professional help arrives. Perhaps you know of a situation where someone — let’s say your colleague Patricia — is providing either short- or long-term care to a relative. You can see that Patricia is affected herself by the support that she is providing, and you wonder how you could assist her, but you are not sure how to approach her in a way that would lead to her accepting your support. Definition Although the term “Mental Health Social Support” is more recent, the broader concept of social support has been evolving over a number of decades. Most definitions include both practical components, such as financial assistance and physical aid, and less obvious aspects, such as encouragement and guidance. In this article, we will include in Mental Health Social Support those types of helping which, over time, serve to: Assist with a helpee’s mental, emotional, and social needs, such as those for self-esteem, comfort, encouragement, and belonging (our main focus) and; Maintain or improve the helpee’s physical wellbeing (Caplan, 1974). Social support research has identified five important functions, or types of Mental Health Social Support: Emotional: This can be defined as: “the availability of one or more persons who can listen sympathetically when an individual is having problems and can provide indications of caring and acceptance” (Wills and Shinar, 2000). It is about how to offer comfort, encouragement, and guidance to someone in distress.
Who are the mental health social supporters providing social support? There are at least four different support types or circumstances through which mental health social supporters can offer social support. They are listed below. Keep in mind this is not a complete list of all the forms Mental Health Social Support can take. It does, however, offer a clear idea of the sorts of places aid can come from.
Who are the Mental Health Social Support recipients: the helpees? All of us could find ourselves in need of help, of being a helpee. It would be rare to find a person who did not need Mental Health Social Support at some stage of their lives. So who are some of the groups who have received aid? There is no shortage of international examples: Befrienders International is an organisation of volunteers helping to prevent suicide in places as diverse as Japan, Sri Lanka, Estonia, and Denmark (Scott, 1996); Older husbands care for wives with dementia and other chronic diseases (Sanders and Power, 2009); St John’s Ambulance in New Zealand has a “friend on the phone” program, in which volunteers become a “friend” to a lonely older person, ringing that person at least once a week for chats, and to offer companionship (albeit by telephone); A public hospital in Albuquerque, New Mexico has for years had a program in which volunteers go coddle newborn babies who are in incubators, and therefore not able to receive much-needed comfort in their first weeks of life. Many communities have a “big brother” or “big sister” program in which the mental health social supporter is a young person who informally “adopts” and mentors a pre-teen child who might otherwise be at risk. The mental health social supporter also provides caring and role modelling for wise life choices. Australia has Community Watch groups in many cities, towns and rural areas, and the State Emergency Service of volunteers who assist in all forms of emergency. Some studies have discovered what sort of aid the supporters need:
Finally, on an informal level but no less significant than the formal programs, there are the “everyday” helpers. These are the neighbours, friends, family members, colleagues, and others in “everyday life” – perhaps people much like yourself — who simply realise that someone they know is stressed or in distress. They respond with caring concern, compassion, and support, whether the distress is as a result of an incident or trauma, or because the distressed person is weighed down by supporting a third party. When such “ordinary” people stop to support another, the person they are listening to becomes a helpee, and another helper/helpee relationship is born. In short, if there is a problem or stressful situation, mental or physical illness, natural disaster or major life change, there will be people needing Mental Health Social Support. From the poor, to the violence-exposed, to at-risk youth and disaster victims, Mental Health Social Support helpees are everywhere, and their helpers increasingly so. You may be wondering why supporting in this way is so important, and how it is relevant to the wellbeing of the recipients. Mental Health Social Support: important, relevant support What does the research show in regard to providing Mental Health Social Support? What does support offer someone in need? How does it affect their lives, the lives of their family members, and the general wellbeing of the community (including that of the mental health social supporter)? An internet search yields thousands of articles on “social support”. Countless studies have examined nearly every angle of this topic, and one thing stands out: receiving Mental Health Social Support helps us. There is a very strong relationship between support and wellbeing because:
How Mental Health Social Support affects lives: the “MOMobile” Case Study Increased personal effectiveness upon receiving Mental Health Social Support was a key finding in a study by Becker et al (2004). While many mental health social supporters work informally, as opposed to in a program such as below, it is nevertheless instructive to see how the extended relationship and emotional support offered to the helpees in this formal program greatly changed their lives. Observing the high infant mortality rate in Philadelphia, a MOMobile program was set up in 1988 as an outreach and family support service. Mental health social supporters, called “Advocates” (trained community health workers), began to go door-to-door and in “MOMobile” vans to underserved neighbourhoods to locate pregnant women and provide prenatal and after-birth support through home visits, telephone follow-ups, health education, and referral to needed services. Results showed that the women became more empowered, that is:
The capacity to change their conditions and influence their own actions came about as a result of believing that they could do so: that is perceived personal effectiveness. This quality was shown to grow in the pregnant women because of their ongoing relationship with the mental health social supporters. Doing the Mental Health Social Support work also helped the Advocates – some of whom had once been low-income pregnant women — make more positive choices in their own lives. While the “MOMmobile” case study is based on a formal program, it provides useful examples of how Mental Health Social Support benefits helpees. Regardless of the population studied or the type of support rendered, Mental Health Social Support is able to improve the lives of those involved with it |
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