The concept of "benefit finding" for people at different stages of recovery from mental illness; a Japanese study.

AbstractBackground: Benefit finding is defined as finding benefits through the struggle with adversity.Aim: This study explored benefit finding at different stages of recovery among people with severe mental illness in Japan.Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire survey, which contained both open-ended questions regarding benefit finding and the Recovery Assessment Scale (RAS), was conducted. Of the responses received from 193 (61%) of 319 individuals with mental illness, responses about benefit finding from 94 questionnaires was analyzed using content analysis (males: 57%; females: 43%; average age: 45 years). Each response about benefit finding was classified into one of three groups according to the stages of recovery by their RAS score (i.e. low, middle or high).Results: The group with higher recovery scores provided more examples of benefit finding, although almost a quarter of examples of benefit finding were provided by the low-RAS group. Different benefit finding characteristics were found betwe...