MENTAL ADAPTATION TO UNEMPLOYMENT

We studied the effects of unemployment on mental well-being by means o f clinical psychiatric examination. The study group comprised of 55 ra ndomly selected employees of a wood processing factory, who had receiv ed notice six months previously as the factory was closing down. The t otal number of workers in the factory was 211 persons. During the inte rview the personality structure, the amount and quality of social supp ort, the nature of self-esteem, future orientation and health of the s ubjects were assessed. In addition, the mental well-being of the subje cts was evaluated by means of a questionnaire. The psychiatric morbidi ty was estimated by General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-score), Beck's d epression score (BDI-score) and by a score assessing psychosomatic sym ptoms (PS-score). Psychiatric diagnosis was established for 49 % of th ose interviewed. Those who received a psychiatric diagnosis did not di ffer from the rest in terms of age, sex or basic education. Subjects w ith mental disorder showed more frequently incomplete personality stru cturalization than the others. A psychiatric diagnosis was associated with lowered self-esteem and uncertain orientation towards the future. The subjects with a psychiatric diagnosis had higher GHQ-score, BDI-s core and PS-score than the rest. People with psychiatric diagnosis rec eived less quantitative and emotional social support. In the linear di scriminant analysis the two groups were most differentiated by self-es teem, the amount of emotional social support and GHQ-score. Age, orien tation toward the future and the personality structuralization also di scriminated to some extent.