An Ethnographic Study of Deinstitutionalized Adults: Their Community Settings and Daily Life Experiences

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Abstract
In the past two decades deinstitutionalization policy has relocated thousands of mentally ill and mentally retarded persons and reshaped a major sector of the health care system. This paper reports a 3-year ethnographic study of 69 deinstitutionalized retarded persons in which occupational therapy and social science participant observers followed subjects in their everyday environments. Field notes, interviews, and videotape data were collected. The aim of the study was to examine the daily lives, living settings, and social circumstances of retarded adults. This paper describes findings on the community residential system and its impact on the lives and adaptation of retarded persons. The discussion of the study methods details the historical development of the research process. The findings presented are an analytic model of the community residential system and a description of adaptive problems of retarded persons living in the community.

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