The role of implicit identity and implicit beliefs in recovery from mental illness (2012-2016)

Effective treatments have been developed for many mental disorders, but it remains a mystery why some patients recover when others who have a similar psychological profile do not. The proposed research takes two approaches to this problem. The first aim is to test the hypothesis that people with a mental illness sometimes unconsciously identify with their mental illness, and this unconscious identification makes them resistant to recovery. The second aim is to test the hypothesis that mental health workers vary in the degree to which they unconsciously believe that people can recover from mental illness, and these unconscious beliefs influence their clients' identification with mental illness and their treatment outcomes.