Lea & Bulewski, Secondary gains from homelessness, page 6 of 1
Secondary gains from homelessness:
the view from on and off the streets
Stephen E. G. Lea* and Adam P. L. Bulewski
School of Psychology, University of Exeter, UK and Department of Psychology, University of Bath, UK
*Corresponding author. Telephone +44 1392 264626; fax +44 1392 264623; email
Abstract
Homelessness is a serious social problem in Britain and many other wealthy, developed economies. Attempts to place homeless people in appropriate and affordable accommodation frequently fail. Homelessness is clearly a highly disadvantaged condition in the long term, but it might represent a preferred short-term option for those who are already on the streets, because they experience "secondary gains" from their situation. We investigated the plausibility of this suggestion from the perspective of homeless people themselves and also of the general public. Homeless people participated in structured interviews at a day centre, while public opinions were sought by postal questionnaire. Among the general public, explanations of homelessness were well described by two orthogonal factors, linked respectively to attributes of the individual and to social processes. Tendencies to endorse these factors varied predictably with age and political affiliation. Homelessness was strongly attributed to problems with alcohol and other drugs. There was little variation or internal structure in public views about secondary gains, which were generally seen as unimportant, with only escape from previous situations and from responsibilities likely to have much impact. Financial incentives were seen as least significant. Among the day centre users, however, a majority recognised at least some short-term advantages of remaining on the streets, which under some conditions could include financial gains. Their attitudes to spending were however conservative and frugal. Bad luck was seen as more important in causing homelessness than drink and drug problems, though the public belief that these are the key factors was recognised.
Keywords
Homelessness; intertemporal choice; secondary gains; lay explanations; alcohol; drugs
1. Introduction
Homelessness is currently a significant, visible, and politically sensitive social problem in many wealthy and economically advanced countries. In the UK, for example, population estimates suggest that in England and Wales 100,000 households are homeless on some definition, and 2,000 individuals are in the worst situation, ‘sleeping rough’ (Social Trends, 1997). Yet there is a pervasive view among professionals, politicians and the general public that in a society as prosperous and well ordered as Britain, no-one needs to be without a home, and it is offensive that anyone should be (The Times, 28 May 1994).
As with many other aspects of poverty, economic psychologists have paid little attention to the homelessness. However, some valuable psychological work has been done. For example Hill (e.g. 1991, 1992ab) has looked at homeless people from the perspective of consumer psychology, while Christian (1998) and Wright (1998) have applied the theory of reasoned action and other social psychological approaches in an attempt to understand why the homeless remain homeless.
From a social policy perspective, the key questions are why people become homeless, and why homeless people remain homeless. From a psychological perspective, the second of these questions is in some ways the more important. The reasons for homelessness are often institutional and political, and psychologists as psychologists can do little about them. However, if some people remain homeless despite considerable political and community effort to help them, there may be psychological processes that are making it difficult for them to escape their situation, and it is possible that psychologists could address these.
One process that could be involved, namely a preference for small, short-term gains from remaining homeless over the longer-term gains of re-entering the mainstream of society. It has often been held that there are class differences in intertemporal choice, with lower class people being less able to delay gratification (e.g. Schneider and Lysgaard, 1953); this has been seen as a cause of ineffective economic behaviours, and thus of people becoming or remaining poor. As Wood (1998) shows, this claim has at best weak empirical support, yet has become almost an axiom of consumer theory. On this conventional view, since the homeless are certainly the most disadvantaged class in a modern economy, we would expect them to show a marked preference for short-term outcomes.
We now know that the very poor show remarkable competence in surviving on very low incomes and in other difficult scenarios (e.g. Kempson, Bryson and Rowlingson 1994), and in this light, the idea that they show poor delay of gratification and that this is why they remain poor seems implausible as well as disrespectful. However if the difficulty of delaying gratification is seen as a response to the constraints of the situation, rather than a deficiency of individuals, it may offer useful insights. Being homeless forces one into the position of dealing with the immediate present and the fundamentals of life (Mulkern and Bradley, 1986), while the drug, emotional and other psychological problems that often lie behind homelessness (Forst, 1994; Belcher and DiBlasio 1990) may also enforce a concentration on present concerns. A life that offers decent accommodation, plus an easier access to the job market, is one that most people would agree offers a greater utility than rooflessness. But for a homeless person, such a position is unlikely to be achieved without at least a couple of years of hard work, involving dealing with difficult personal issues and slowly moving through different phases of accommodation (Van der Ploeg and Scholte 1997). Along the way there may be economic costs. For example O’Leary (1997) states that if one moves off the street into a hostel, even though the rate of benefits increases by 300%, personal income for the individual will decrease by up to 700%, because of hostel costs. Charters' (1997) book on how to budget for food, written for homeless people finding themselves in accommodation, illustrates the problems that exist for those who suddenly find themselves paying bills and having to budget for the first time. This is particularly relevant if one considers that many homeless people have been for periods of time living in a different economic world from the rest of us (Hill and Stamey 1990). Objectively, none of these costs outweigh the obvious benefits of obtaining work and accommodation, but the costs are immediate and certain. The benefits can be realised only in the long run, and even a determined effort to escape from homelessness may fail.
Furthermore, there may even be benefits in remaining in the homeless state. To capture this possibility, we borrow the concept of "secondary gain" from psychiatry (for review, see Fishbain, Rosomoff, Cutler and Rosomoff, 1995). Homelessness is without doubt a severely unpleasant condition. But like other unpleasant conditions, such as psychiatric disorder, or indeed physical injury, it may offer some small, immediate advantages to those who suffer it. In these other fields, psychologists and psychiatrists have found it fruitful to investigate what these secondary gains might be, so that their impact can be assessed and, perhaps, neutralised.
The intertemporal choice/secondary gain approach to the question of why people remain homeless is one example of a psychological or individual explanation of an economic behaviour. In studies of "lay explanations" of economic phenomena, it is repeatedly found that there are social variations in public beliefs about the causes of economic misfortunes such as poverty and unemployment. Those who are wealthier, of higher occupational class, or politically on the right are more likely to attribute such conditions to characteristics of the individual; those who are poorer, lower class or on the left are more likely to attribute them to structural, social factors, or to chance and fate (e.g. Feagin, 1972; Lewis, Snell and Furnham, 1987). Toro and McDonell (1993) have shown that lay explanations of homelessness follow something of the same pattern.
Our aim was to compare the explanations of homelessness offered by homeless people themselves, with those offered by a sample of the general public living in the same location. We were particularly interested in the plausibility to the respondents of intertemporal choice and secondary gains ideas. However, we also included questions about other possible causes of homelessness, and its impacts, so as not to lead our respondents into a particular explanatory framework.
2. Method
2.1. Participants. The homeless people who participated were 25 clients at a day centre for the homeless and marginalised in a medium-sized southern English city. They were recruited by the second author, who worked for 9 months as a volunteer in the centre and knew them personally. The respondents included most of the clients who attended the centre frequently and regularly during that period. Consent was obtained from the day centre to carry out the study, and participants were asked individually for their consent before they answered the questions.
The general public sample were recruited by delivering an invitation to participate to every fourth house in streets within four districts of the same city, selected so as to cover a range of different socio-economic profiles. A hundred questionnaires were distributed in each district.
2.2. Materials and procedures. The homeless people took part in a structured interview. The questions, and standard answers to be offered, had been agreed in advance with the day centre staff, in order to minimise the risk of offending or damaging any client. The questions dealt with financial and other issues involved in gaining jobs and accommodation, and managing money, as well as gathering some basic demographic information. Interviews were carried out individually, and despite the structured script, the conversation was allowed to range informally so long as it did not appear to be touching on matters that were inappropriately sensitive or personal. Members of the general public sample were sent a letter inviting them to participate, enclosing a 6-page questionnaire. This covered many of the same areas as the interviews with homeless people, but in a different format. Respondents were asked about contacts they had had with homeless people, and then asked to rate, on a 7-point scale, 21 possible reasons for homelessness, 8 possible negative effects, and 6 possible positive effects. They were also asked some general questions about homelessness, and basic demographic information was requested. Questionnaires were returned by post. All participants, in both groups, were assured of anonymity in the analysis and presentation of results, and promised access to a summary of results at the end of the investigation.
3. Results: The homeless
3.1 Sample characteristics.
The homeless participants included 5 women and 20 men. Four were between 18 and 20 in age, 12 between 21 and 40, and 8 between 41 and 69 (one would give her age). Many were not currently on the streets, but they had experienced life on the streets and some were at risk of going back
3.2 Perceived reasons for homelessness
Several respondents stressed the "bad luck" aspect of becoming homelessness: the sudden loss of a job, the breakdown of a relationship, even a theft at a vulnerable moment. But the same respondents also saw individual factors as contributing to people remaining homeless, including but not only drink and drug habits; after a time of being homeless you could become a "cave man", thinking only about the next source of food, and not setting a proper value on objects or even life. Respondents felt that the general public looked down on them and thought all homeless people were "winos and junkies", though perhaps only because they do not know what it is like to be homeless.
3.3 The economics of street life.
Four large economic landmarks exist within the homeless world: social security benefits, hostels, the Big Issue (a newspaper produced for street sale by the homeless), and drink and drugs.
(a) Benefits. In the UK it is impossible to obtain benefits without an address, but homeless people were allowed to use the centre as an address for benefit purposes and many did so. Centre staff reported that benefits claimed could in some cases total more than normal unemployment benefit.
(b) Hostels. Escaping from homelessness usually means moving into a hostel of some kind. But these were regarded very negatively: most respondents said that whatever the money offered they would not use a hostel. Just over half of them had either left hostels themselves, or knew someone who had. The main reasons given for leaving accommodation were financial (by far the majority response), rules and regulations, the condition of the hostel and lack of progression offered. Financially, respondents questioned the value hostels offered; some stated that people end up sleeping on mattresses but had to pay the same as those on proper beds, another thought hostels ‘use’ homeless people and gave very little in return. One respondent pointed out that if you get a job you have to pay the full amount from your wage to the hostel, with the result that you would be forced back onto the streets. A couple of respondents thought that some homeless people do not sign on properly and use their money on drugs rather than a hostel. For some of the respondents, the rules and regulations of a local hostel were a major problem. One had had to leave because she was found smoking; another felt that the management had wanted to get rid of him because he was seen as a troublemaker, and put pressure on him until he blew up: they could use rules and regulations to hide their real agenda. The whole disorienting experience of moving from the streets to a hostel was expressed by one respondent: "it is a big leap from the streets to four walls and a ceiling, and a hostel has more rules and regulations than society at large, while there are no rules whatever on the streets". The short-term costs of trying to escape homelessness could be severe.