Predicting adaptive functioning among mentally ill persons in community settings

Attempts to improve instrumental role performance among mentally ill persons have traditionally focused on the modification of individual level variables. Recent interest in environmental-behavioral linkages, however, has led to attempt to isolate environmental variables which are both readily manipulable and significantly related to improved instrumental role performance. The present study examines the impact of a variety of individual, residential, and community variables on instrumental role performance using multiple regression analysis. The 10 variables in the equation had a multiple r of .77 with total score on the Residential portion of the Adaptive Functioning Index, indicating that they account for 60% of the variance in scores. Individual level variables account for 3% of the variance, while environmental variables, primarily those related to normalization account for 57% of the variance. The data suggest that environmental normalization may be an effective technology as well as an ideology.