Quantitative Measures Informing Occupational Literacy

BACKGROUND Occupational therapists need to learn to think, act and effect change at social and cultural levels (Whiteford, 2000). Occupational literacy as described by Townsend (2015) is a way of thinking, talking, writing,... [ view full abstract ]

BACKGROUND
Occupational therapists need to learn to think, act and effect change at social and cultural levels (Whiteford, 2000). Occupational literacy as described by Townsend (2015) is a way of thinking, talking, writing, making decisions, and making sense of occupational justice.
In order for occupational literacy and occupational justice to have credibility, this dialogue must be based on solid evidence, research and theory. This presentation provides a method for obtaining occupation specific evidence of a whole environment in congregate settings and highlights occupational deprivation.
METHOD
The Assessment Tool of Occupation and Social Engagement (ATOSE) was used to observe the interactive occupation and social engagement of residents in a mental health unit for older people in Ireland.
RESULTS
Residents spent 10.7% of their time in interactive occupation ( 3.7% in social engagement and 2.9% receiving care). In contrast they spent most of their time staring into space, with eyes closed or showing agitated behaviours (82.7%). Interrater reliability for the observations was 91.8%. Specific environmental characteristics (social, physical and organizational) which created occupational deprivation were recorded and are reported here.
CONCLUSION
This research identifies social and occupational deprivation. The ATOSE observational method is a powerful way to examine the effects of the environment on occupation.
APPLICATION TO PRACTICE
The ATOSE method generates occupational literacy: understanding how the environment shapes interactive occupation and social engagement. Furthermore, this method can judge the functioning of congregate environments from an occupation perspective. This occupational literacy can be used to underpin planning and creating better environments.