Engagement and interaction: a comparison between supported employment and day service provision.
Real jobs create more engagement and natural social connections than day programs for adults with intellectual disability.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers watched the adults with intellectual disability at work. Half worked real jobs with support. Half went to day programs.
The team timed how long each person stayed on task. They counted who talked to whom. They watched for 60 hours across four weeks.
What they found
People in supported employment stayed on task a large share of the time. Day program clients worked only a large share of the time.
Supported workers chatted with coworkers and customers 15 times per hour. Day program clients spoke mainly with staff.
Day programs had more staff talking at clients. Real jobs created more natural back-and-forth conversations.
How this fits with other research
Lincoln et al. (1988) first showed that real workplaces have more natural social give-and-take than we expect. This study proves those natural talks actually happen when we place people with disabilities in those jobs.
Luecking (2011) later showed employers want workers who solve real problems. This 1996 data shows supported employment creates exactly those problem-solving moments through natural coworker interactions.
Baldwin et al. (2014) found adults with autism want more workplace support. This study suggests the support comes from the job itself when placed in real work settings.
Why it matters
If you write job placement goals, focus on natural workplace interactions instead of staff-led social skills groups. The job creates its own social curriculum.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Work and non-work experiences of 16 adults with learning disabilities were compared. The results indicated that people spent significantly more of their time engaged in task-related activities during paid work than in non-work situations, where high levels of disengagement were observed. Interaction patterns varied considerably across conditions, people spending more of their time interacting with others in the non-work condition, possibly as a result of high levels of supervisory support from service staff. Differences were also observed in the direction of interaction, with clients more likely to initiate interactions in the non-work condition. A breakdown of who interactions occurred with revealed that clients tended to talk with supervisors more often than anyone else in the non-work condition. During work, clients tended to interact more often with their non-disabled co-workers, and a significant proportion of time was spent interacting with the public. The findings are discussed in relation to the relative success of the employment movement and suggestions for further research are made.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 1996 · doi:10.1046/j.1365-2788.1996.777777.x