Motivational orientation of people participating in vocational rehabilitation.

Purpose: The task of vocational rehabilitation is to support the employee's chances of continuing in working life. The study aimed to examine the motivational orientation of people participating in vocational rehabilitation and to find out what characteristics of the clients, their life situation, and their beliefs and perceptions were associated with it.

Methods: A mail questionnaire was answered by 839 rehabilitation clients who had received an affirmative rehabilitation decision under the earnings-related pension scheme 12 months earlier (response rate 67 %). Two variables depicting motivational orientation were formed, i.e., motivation for continuing in working life and motivation for participating in vocational rehabilitation. Logistic regression analyses were applied in examining the factors associated with each motivation variable.

Results: The results indicate that the two motivational orientations can be regarded as partly separate and partly overlapping constructs. The rehabilitation clients' motivational orientations were associated with their experiences and their perceptions on environmental factors and future possibilities, both those that precipitated the application for rehabilitation and those that are important in their current life situation and their perceived future possibilities.

Conclusions: In the planning of individual rehabilitation processes there is a clear need to sort out what factors may hide behind the client's weak contextual or situational motivation. In the course of the rehabilitation process, it is important to discuss these factors in order to alleviate the clients' uncertainty towards change and enhance their motivation to participate in rehabilitation and re-think their future prospects of returning to work.