Daily Life Anxieties of People with Mental Disabilities― Focusing on their Living Conditions ―ISHIDA Kenya
Aomori University of Health and Welfare
Key Words ①Daily Life Anxieties ② People with Mental Disabilities③ Living Conditions
ⅠPurpose and Research Design
The purpose of this study is to investigate factors which affect anxieties about daily life ofpeople with mental disabilities who use the daily activities of the social welfare services inYokohama city (the users). This study focuses on relations between their daily life anxieties
and their living conditions. This study is part of larger project investigating the users’ qualityof life, particularly concerning to social welfare services for the middle or elderly users.
Ⅱ Method
1 Data Collection and Subjects
The survey was conducted by sending the questionnaires to 91 WSBOs (Welfare Services
Business Officers) in Yokohama city asking their users to fill in. The survey was conductedfrom January through March 2016. The researcher regarded the responses from the users asconsent to the survey. 54 WSBOs sent back questionnaires which covered 491 uses’ responses.
All of the returned questionnaires were checked, and only valid ones were used for the dataanalysis. The data were subjected to statistical analysis and SPSS ver.22.0 software was used.
2 Ethical Consideration
The survey was conducted with the approval of the Ethics Committee of the university
where the researcher belonged to.
3 Questionnaire
The questionnaire consists of three sections: demographic characteristics, living conditions
and presence of daily life anxieties.
Ⅲ Results
1 Demographic Characteristics
The respondents were 64.8% male and 35.2% female. The largest age group was users intheir 40s (33.7%). The lengths of time respondents had used WSBOs were “1-3years (22.5%),”“5-10years (19.5%)” and “over 10years (19.5%).” With regard to accommodation, 30.9% of theusers lived alone and 69.1% of the users lived with family. Sources of income were “earningmoney at the WSBOs (67.8%)”, followed by “pensions (52.2%)” and “public assistance (44.3%).”
The types of mental illness were “schizophrenia (66.2%),” “depression (14.7%),” “dependency(8.9%),” “developmental disability (5.3%)” and “intellectual disability (4.3%).”
2 Presence of daily life anxieties
The presence of daily life anxieties was “yes (89.9%)” and “no (10.1%).” The main anxieties
were “financial difficulties (81.7%)” and “their own health problems (80.0%).”3 Logistic Regression
Logistic regression was done to clarify the factors which affected daily life anxieties ofusers. Dependent variable was a “having daily life anxieties (yes=1, no=0).” Independent
variables were seven: “sex (male=1,female=2),” “age (10s=1, over 60s=7),” “accommodation(living alone=1, living with family=0),” “schizophrenia (yes=1, no=0),” “depression (yes=1,no=0),” “other disease(s) (yes=1, no=0)” and “public aid (yes=1, no=0).” The result was shownin Table1. Controlling for other characteristics of users, the users living alone were found to
get significantly higher odds of experiencing a marked rise in anxieties compared with theusers living with family (p<.05). The users with other disease(s) got also high odds than theusers without (p<.05). The users benefiting from public aid also got lower odds than the users
without (.05<p<.1). Age didn’t affect the daily life anxieties much (p>.05).
Table1Result of Logistic Regression Analysis Predicting Daily Life Anxieties
VariableWaldB

SE

OR

95%CI

Sex

0.333

0.36

1.40

[0.69,2.82]

0.86

0.36

Age

0.214

0.15

1.24

[0.92,1.66]

2.03

0.16

living alone

1.054

0.46

2.87

[1.18,7.01]

5.36

0.02

schizophrenia

0.584

0.37

1.79

[0.87,3.72]

2.46

0.12

depression

0.989

0.65

2.69

[0.75,9.67]

2.29

0.13

any other disease

1.429

0.65

4.17

[1.16,15.01]

4.790.03

public aid-0.699

0.35

0.50

[0.25,0.99]

4.00

0.05

statisticpNote. CI= confidence interval for odds ratio (OR).

Ⅳ Discussion
This finding highlights that the users living alone feel more daily life anxieties than theusers with family (about three times). And the users with other disease(s) feel more anxieties
than the users with only mental disease (about four times). WSBOs offer variety of the daily
activity programs for the users, also 24hrs services such as telephone counseling. However
WSBOs are not single answer, WSBOs cannot reduce the anxieties enough. Other result alsosuggests that the users benefiting from public aid feel less anxieties than the users without.
That means positive utilization of social services will reduce the daily life anxieties.
Ⅴ Literature
横浜市精神障害者地域生活支援連合会（2006）「地域作業所・小規模授産施設の利用と生活に関する満足度調査」
特定非営利法人 横浜市精神障害者地域生活支援連合会

横浜精神保健福祉研究所．

ISHIDA Kenya: Another Role of IBASYO. 鴨台社会福祉学論集（Taisyo University Association of Social
Welfare Studies）24,86-92,2015.

Ⅵ Academic Conference Presentation（誌上発表、学会発表）
日本社会福祉学会東北部会第 16 回研究大会, 第 5 回日本精神保健福祉学会学術集会, 青森県保健医療福祉研究発表会
ISHIDA Kenya 58-1 Mase Hamadate Aomori 030-8505 Japan

E-mail: k_isida@auhw.ac.jp