"You wouldn't want to talk to someone who doesn't understand": Mental health service user attitudes towards practitioners with lived experience of mental ill-health.

Abstract

The working relationship between mental health practitioners and service users is one of the greatest determinants of therapeutic success. However, drivers of a productive service user-practitioner relationship are still insufficiently understood, with particularly limited exploration of service users' perspectives. The present study aims to address a gap in the working alliance literature through a qualitative exploration of service user attitudes towards seeking treatment from a practitioner with personal experience of mental ill-health. Semi-structured interviews and an online survey were completed by adults (N = 35) who self-identified as mental health service users. Participant attitudes were varied, although generally positive, and reflexive thematic analysis developed understandings of how a practitioner's lived experience of mental ill-health may be considered a therapeutic resource to strengthen working alliance. The social identity model of the working alliance provided valuable insights, where practitioner lived experience of mental ill-health poses an additional avenue for facilitating the therapeutic relationship.