Relationship between sociometric status and patient-rated helpfulness in a small informal psychiatric patient group

The purpose of this study was to determine if there would be a positive correlation between a person's degree of perceived helpfulness, as evaluated by fellow psychiatric patients, and their sociometric status in the patient group. The study was also designed to ascertain whether psychiatric patients are perceived as being more helpful than non-helpful by fellow patients. A check list describing helpful versus non-helpful behavior was constructed using twenty behavioral adjectives. Forty-four patients on two wards at the Utah State Hospital were asked to rate fellow patients on their degree of helpfulness. These patients were also asked to answer five sociometric questions, choosing five peers for each of five ward activities. As a result of the lack of meaningful data from the group of twenty-seven male patients, only the data obtained from the group of twenty-seven female patients were analyzed. The results showed patients to be rated as being helpful a greater percentage of the time than non-helpful. A high positive correlation was found between an individual's score as a helping person and his sociometric status. Patients who were judged as being highly helpful tended to be high status members of the patient group and patients judged as being less helpful tended to be low status members of the patient group. Implications for psychiatric nursing and for further research in the area of patient-patient interaction were discussed.