A narrative analytic study of the meaning of home: The case of Danish psychiatric outpatients
Translated title
A narrative analytic study of the meaning of home: The case of Danish psychiatric
Authors
Gallas, Claudia ; Andersen, Casper
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2015
Submitted on
2015-05-29
Pages
171
Abstract
This thesis uses a narrative small-stories approach to explore how five Danish psychiatric outpatients across the Jutland peninsula construct the meaning of “home” in relation to their treatment and diagnosis. Motivated by an ongoing shift toward outpatient care in Denmark, the study positions home and everyday life as increasingly central sites of care, with both opportunities and complications. Drawing on a transactional perspective, home is conceptualized as an active, interdependent person–environment relation that emerges through everyday activities and talk. Based on interviews analyzed for everyday narratives, the study finds that home is experienced as transient and ambivalent yet essential to recovery: a site for activities and identity work crucial to illness management. At the same time, moving treatment into the home can risk pathologizing daily practices and create ongoing negotiations between treatment demands and maintaining a sense of self beyond the patient role. The thesis therefore argues for greater clinical attention to everyday physical and social arenas and to managing concrete daily challenges rather than only abstract symptoms, and calls for further research on ethically integrating everyday life into care and fostering practitioner–patient partnerships.
Denne specialeundersøgelse anvender en narrativ, småfortællingsorienteret tilgang til at belyse, hvordan fem danske psykiatriske ambulante patienter på tværs af Jylland skaber mening om “hjem” i relation til deres behandling og diagnose. Baggrunden er et markant skifte mod mere ambulant behandling i Danmark, som gør hjem og hverdagsliv til centrale arenaer for behandling med både potentialer og dilemmaer. Med et transaktionelt perspektiv forstås hjem som en aktiv og indbyrdes afhængig person–miljø-relation, der bliver til gennem hverdagsaktiviteter og fortællinger i samtale. På grundlag af interviews analyseret med fokus på små hverdagshistorier viser studiet, at hjemmet opleves som foranderligt og ambivalent, men også som en essentiel ressource i recovery: et sted for aktiviteter og identitetsarbejde, der er vigtige i sygdomsmestring. Samtidig kan flytningen af behandling ind i hjemmet risikere at patologisere hverdagspraksisser og skabe en vedvarende forhandling mellem behandlingskrav og ønsket om at fastholde et selv ud over patientrollen. På den baggrund foreslås et styrket klinisk fokus på hverdagens fysiske og sociale arenaer og på håndtering af konkrete hverdagsudfordringer frem for alene abstrakte symptomer, samt behov for videre forskning i etisk forankret integration af hjemmet i behandlingen og udvikling af partnerskaber mellem fagpersoner og patienter.
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Keywords
psychiatric outpatients ; meaning ; home ; narrative ; small story ; transactional ; treatment ; Danish