Model Coherency

(STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION)

This is an important concept in SRV.   It relates to analysing services for (and other interventions with) devalued people.  Such devalued people are often offered services which are 'strange', 'weird', 'unusual' compared with those that fulfil the same basic needs for valued or 'normal' people.  For instance, most relatively valued people will live in ordinary housing, work in ordinary workplaces, gain education in ordinary education facilities and take their leisure in ordinary leisure places.  Devalued people are frequently receive such basic life needs (home, work, education, leisure) in less than normative locations and programmes.  Sometimes it is difficult to understand what is really going on- whether these 'alternative' (less than normative) solutions are because of a real societal need (for instance with prisoners or with potentially dangerous people who are mentally ill) or solely because they are viewed as 'just a devalued group, getting its 'just deserts'', that is to say, less than that offered to valued people.

Such 'strange' alternate facilities are often difficult to understand and analyse.  SRV uses three methods of determining 'what is going on' in these facilities.

These are:

Model Coherency                        -           dealt with on this page

Culturally Valued Analogue         -          Culturally Valued Analogue

Overt/Covert  Goals and

Manifest and Latent  Function       -        Overt/Covert, Manifest/Latent 

Before you read further you should have a basic understanding of the Culturally Valued Analogue.

Model Coherency, A Definition

A model is something that is like something else, for instance, a dolls house is a model of a real house, a toy car is a model of a real car.

Coherency means how well pieces fit and interact together.

Model coherency is a measure of how well the component parts of a service fit and interact together and how easy it is to understand.

What Does Model Coherency Require     

1/        Identifying central needs (the service purpose), 

 2/       Separation of service function (home, work, education, leisure etc.), and 

 3/        Identification of how this would be provided for valud people.

Example 1

Multi-person residence for people with mental illness

Primary function - 'Home' (even though it might include educative, work-like or leisure-related functions, 'Home' always takes precedence if it occurs because the influence of home is so much greater than other functions.)

Central Needs- meeting all assumed needs of a group of people with mental illness

Service Function- Home

Analogue for valued people- A family house.

Example 2

A Day-Service for people with developmental difficulties

Primary function as 'Work' if the service recipients were adult, or 'Education' if the recipients were children.

Central needs- meeting daytime activity needs of a group of people with developmental difficulties.

Service Function- Work or Education

Analogue for valued people- Workplace or School/College

Example 3

A Disco Club for people with a variety of problems (mental illness, Developmental Difficulties, Physical Impairment)

Primary Function- Socialization

Central Needs- Leisure

Service Function- Leisure

Analogue for valued people- Dance Hall, Bar, Singles Club, Interests Club etc.

Having decided on Primary Function, Central Needs, Service Function and An Analogue for valued people, we can then go on to investigate how Relevant the service is, how Potent it is, and if it is Model Coherent.

Relevancy of a Service

Relevance is decided by how well a service meets the real needs of an individual or group. 

For instance, and adequate ordinary house with a normal family structure of its function meets the needs of people for a Home very well- it is entirely relevant. 

However, a multi-occupancy residence for young people with mental health problems may meet the needs of a service provider or society very well (See  Overt/Covert, Manifest/Latent ) but may fail totally to provide any of the essentials of Home.  It is not relevant.

Potency of a Service

Potency is a measure of how much appropriate effort is made to help an individual or group to meet their real needs.

For instance, a good school with dedicated teachers committed to helping young people to reach for high academic and social goals will meet the needs of people for Education very well- it is Potent.

However, Special Education in a school for people with educational difficulties which concentrates on controlling behaviour and occupying the users to avoid any confrontation will not be seen as potent, despite its successful function of meeting the needs of Valued schools and parents for the daytime occupation of such service users (See  Overt/Covert, Manifest/Latent )

Examples of Relevant, Potent and Modelly Coherent Services for Valued People compared with those for Devalued People

  In services for valued people, there is usually a high degree of relevance, potency and model coherency. 

For instance, if you go to a lawyer or Citizen’s Advice Bureau, it is likely to be in an office setting in an office area, staffed by skilled people with appropriate qualifications.  The people will treat you as a client worthy of respect and will not necessarily know of your illnesses or personal history.  They will make every effort to find out what your real problem is and try to apply the best means to address it.  They will owe a duty of care to the client.

Advice to people with mental health problems is often given in leisure centres for people with mental health problems.  Advice is often given by nurses.  The surrounding are often scruffy and only marginally like a modern office.  The advice giver will normally know the full personal and medical history of the client.  Furthermore, the advice giver will often have a duty to share information discussed with a clinical team.  The model is incoherent.  Additionally, only lip-service may be given to trying to find out what the real problem is, and only partial efforts may be made to overcome the problem.  They will owe a duty of care to the service.

ADD OTHERS

What Usually Happens to Devalued People?

Such Relevant, Potent Modelly Coherent services are rarely available for devalued people.

What Effect Does this Have?

 If the majority of services offered to people-at-risk lack relevance and potency and are model incoherent, this will do further damage to those people in terms of image and competence.

 Unfortunately most services offered to people-at-risk are not relevant, potent or model coherent.

Why Service Models Are Rarely Coherent?

Services for people-at-risk in the area are not comprehensive, they lack a range of options which leads to pressure to provide more than one function within a single service.  This leads to reduction in pressures to design new and valued options.

Also, we have inherited past services which have: models from past types of services; locations, buildings, internal fittings from past services; staff identities, expectations, hierarchies from past services; schedules and routines from past services; methods and processes from past services; service user groupings from past services.

all this made worse by  Lack of awareness by planners.

ADD EXAMPLES

Why is Model Coherency Important?

·       It encourages competence and experience enhancement

·       It encourages image enhancement

·       It focuses attention on real needs and purposes

·       It promotes the most effective use of resources

·       It ensures that purpose is not diluted by multi-function efforts

·       It encourages greater choice for working together

·       It encourages greater choice for collective responsibility

·       It promotes development of generic resources

EXPLAIN

Criteria For Coherency

1/   Based on what people served actually need in ways that are familiar and valued according to local standards

      (THEORETICAL CONSISTENCY)

2/   Do all the component parts of the response fit together with each other?

      (INTERNAL CONSISTENCY)

3/   Around one single service purpose 

      (FUNCTION CONSISTENCY)

4/   In accordance with stated intention 

      (MANIFEST FUNCTION CONSISTENCY)

(EXPLAIN)

Model Coherency - The Key Principle

·       Key Principle:

The primary (central) function of a service should

Meet the primary/main/most important/fundamental) needs of the people who use the service.

According to Social Role Valorisation , The service should do this in a way that other (valued) citizens (us!!)

·       Would:             Understand, expect to see, recognise 

(CULTURALLY NORMATIVE)

·       Would:    Want, demand, desire/aspire to

(CULTURALLY VALUED)

·       This should:             Be the same as, equivalent to, correspond to, be an

(ANALOGUE OF THE SERVICE)

·       Therefore we need to establish and describe the

CULTURALLY VALUED ANALOGUE

 Culturally Valued Analogue

(EXPLAIN)

Model Coherency Impact Rating

Is covered here:

Model Coherency Impact Rating

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