Wanna grab some dinner? Social relations between helping professionals and members of community mental health or other human service organizations.

Purpose: Could practitioners and members (consumers) of mental health or other organizations interact socially by regularly going out for drinks or dinner together, for example? The American Psychological Association explicitly states for example, "your psychologist shouldn't also be your friend." However such social interactions have occurred for decades in certain clubhouse-modeled community mental healthcare, and maybe research and a more balanced perspective is warranted.

Design/method: We interviewed six clubhouse staff that interact socially with members and held three focus groups with 20 members.