Personal narratives in schizophrenia: increases in coherence following 5 months of vocational rehabilitation.

Many researchers have hoped vocational rehabilitation might help people with schizophrenia not only to work but also to develop more coherent narratives of their abilities and the boundaries imposed by their condition. This study compared narrative accounts of persons with schizophrenia spectrum disorders (n = 16) generated using the Indiana Psychiatric Illness Interview prior to and 5 months following entry into a vocational rehabilitation program. Results revealed participants with more intact levels of neurocognitive function as assessed with the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test demonstrated significant gains in narrative coherence relative to those with greater levels of deficit (F(1,14) = 6.3, p = .02).