中華心理衛生協會

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to: 1) explore the willingness of employers inTaiwan to hire people with mental illness; 2) determine the factors that influenceemployers’ willingness; 3) understand employers’ attitudes and concerns about Taiwan’semployment policy for people with mental illness; and 4) analyze the conditions, problems,and intervention protocols for employment of people with mental illness. Methods: Basedon the results of a literature review and qualitative research, we developed a questionnaireto investigate employers’ willingness, attitudes, and perceptions toward hiring mentally illpeople in Taiwan. Stratified sampling was used to select 501 employers. The overallresponse rate of employers who completed questionnaires was 93.81% (470 employers).Results: The results showed that: 1) employers held negative views regarding hiringpeople with mental illness; 2) although most employers agreed that people with mentalillness have the right to work, more than half had negative emotions and concernsregarding symptoms and work competencies; 3) the main factors that affected employers’willingness to hire included employers’ perceptions of their ability to hire people withmental illness and employers’ emotional reaction toward mentally ill people andacceptance of their right to work; and 4) most employers were not aware of theemployment policy and for some who were aware, its economic incentives seemed weak.Most employers had insufficient knowledge regarding mental illness. Conclusions: Toincrease employers’ willingness to hire people with mental illness, the government shouldstrengthen the supported employment system for both the employers and the employees.For example, the government could not only increase the number of job coaches, but alsotheir professional requirements, pay, and benefits. In addition, we suggest the governmentmodify the economic inducements to enhance employers’ willingness to hire. Finally,effort should be made to increase social awareness of the government’s employment policyand to enhance knowledge and acceptance with regard to mental illness.