Strengthening Financial Literacy for People Living with Serious Mental Illness

At a glance

Funded by: Garvey Institute for Brain Health Solutions January 1, 2025 - December 31, 2025
Principal Investigator(s): Kate Comtois Becky Sladek
Research Team:
Participating Agencies:
Research Setting:

About

Improved financial literacy among people living with serious mental illness (SMI) is associated with a higher quality of life, fewer hospitalizations, and better treatment adherence. Yet people living with SMI frequently express how their lack of financial knowledge has negative personal consequences and that they don’t know where to turn for assistance. This project will gather qualitative and quantitative data from people admitted to the Center for Behavioral Health and Learning, a psychiatric hospital, to understand the need and desire for a financial skills intervention and its role in discharge planning. The assessment will also seek input from family members/caregivers, representative payees/fiduciaries and experts in the community. Ultimately, we hope to create a replicable, standardized intervention that can be evaluated and implemented in inpatient settings and modified as necessary for outpatient settings.

 

The cycle of money and mental health problems

A four-section diagram describing the cycle of money and mental health problems, with a green arrow pointing in a clockwise direction from each rectangular section to depict the relationship between each section. Starting from the left-most section, the first rectangle has the words "Mental health problems". The subsequent rectangle in the cycle has the words "Mental health problems make it harder to earn, manage money and spending, and to ask for help". The third and right-most section has the words "Financial difficulty". The fourth section has the words "Financial difficulty causes stress and anxiety, made worse by collections activity or going without essentials". The arrow from the fourth rectangle points back to the first rectangle, "Mental health problems".
 Source: Money and Mental Health Policy Institute, 2019.

Outcomes

  • Research in Progress