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This publication is based on a research thesis which examined self‐help ethnic minority organisations and their activities in order to construct an accurate picture of the library and information needs of their members. It identified the kinds of co‐operation that existed between self‐help ethnic minority organisations and public libraries and other relevant official agencies. A series of models for co‐operation that could take place between public libraries, other relevant agencies and self‐help organisations was constructed.

Self Help Services is a pioneering charity in how it champions personal experience of mental health and uses these experiences in the treatment of people living with common mental health problems – anxiety, depression, phobias, and low self‐esteem issues. This paper aims to describe how the charity grew from one individual's journey with agoraphobia to being the main provider of primary care mental health services in the North West of England.

The paper charts the growth of Self Help Services over time, with a particular focus on its employment of people with personal mental health problems. It describes the experiences of its founder and Chief Officer and includes case studies of a user of its e‐therapy services and the charity's Informatics and Governance Lead.

The case studies illustrate how the charity has grown in both size and success as a result of harnessing the skills and experience of large numbers of staff and volunteers living with a mental health problem. The case studies illustrate that, rather than being an issue, these personal experiences are vital tools in helping others work through their own difficulties.

The paper provides a detailed overview of a charity which was unique when it was formed and now thrives as a result of its uniqueness. It provides other similar organisations with advice on lessons learnt along the way, and advice for individuals or groups looking to establish similar organisations.

In the absence of direct employee involvement, customers sharing knowledge and know-how with other customers during self-service encounters is key for promoting service quality. This study assessed the extent to which customer support and help during self-service encounters could simply be explained by multiple motivations of the social exchange theory.

A survey approach was followed. The model was tested among 258 electronic banking customers in South Africa and later cross-validated among 253 electronic banking customers in Australia. Multi-group confirmatory factor analysis with country as the grouping variable, latent variable modelling and indirect tests were performed to assess interrelationships among diverse factors that may contribute to customer support and help during self-service encounters, as accounted for by motivations of the social exchange theory.

Adequate model fit was obtained for the combined structural model, which was based on the invariant model. Value contribution and competence affirmation, pleasure derived from helping, reciprocity and reputation enhancement are relevant motivations of the social exchange theory that may impact customer support and help through knowledge sharing.

The study provides a simplified and more cohesive explanation of customers' motivations for engaging in customer support and helping behaviours during self-service encounters.

Service providers seeking guidance on knowledge sharing among customers, which may lead to greater service quality, should benefit from this research.

The findings contribute to greater understanding of social exchanges by customers who provide support and help to other customers during self-service encounters, and that ultimately may affect service quality.

This article discusses the labelling and location of self‐organising community groups ‐ ‘self‐help’, ‘peer support’ and ‘service user’. It notes the increasingly close relationship between these groups and statutory authorities, and how this relationship may put the benefits of the groups at risk. Historical, cultural and social factors are discussed to help explain differences and separate developments within African, Caribbean and other Black communities.

Purpose: The aim is to explore how family relations are affected by societal changes in relation to informal and formal caregiving and self-determination of older adults.

Design/methodology/approach: Care managers (CMs)/social workers (SWs) (N = 124) participated in a comparative vignette study including Japan, South Korea, and Sweden. Systems theory was used.

Findings: Japanese CMs/SWs clearly describe their efforts to create networks in a relational way between formal and informal actors in the community. South Korean CMs/SWs balance between suggesting interventions to support daily life at home or a move to a nursing home, often acknowledging the family as the main caregiver. In Sweden, CMs/SWs highlight the juridical element in meeting the older adult and the interventions offered, and families primarily give social support. Regarding self-determination, the Japanese priority is for CMs/SWs to harmonize within the family and the community. South Korean CMs/SWs express ambivalent attitudes to older adults’ capability for self-determination in the intersection between formal and family care. Swedish CMs/SWs adhere to the older adult’s self-determination, while acknowledging the role of the family in persuading the older adult to accept interventions. The results suggest emerging defamilialization in South Korea, while tendencies to refamilialization are noticed in Japan and Sweden, albeit in different ways.

Research limitations/implications: In translation, nuances may be lost. A focus on changing families shows that country-specific details in care services have been reduced. For future research, perspectives of “care” need to be studied on different levels.

Originality/value: Using one vignette in three countries with different welfare regimes, discussing changing views on families’, communities’ and societal caregiving is unique. This captures changes in policy, influencing re- and defamilialization.

Around the UK, a number of strategies are being employed to expand the availability and increase the accessibility of psychological treatments for anxiety and depression. Recommended interventions include supported self‐help programs based on CBT principles such as computerised cognitive behavioural therapies (CCBT) for mild‐to‐moderate depression, phobia, and panic. This paper seeks to describe innovative third sector, service‐user led CCBT clinics commissioned within Greater Manchester.

The paper describes how the project was initially set up, how the services are managed, how they work, and the impact of these services on the population they serve.

The CCBT clinic achieves a high throughput of service‐users, including more than one‐third accessing the service through self‐referral. Intake and outcome measures suggest that CCBT service users are representative of both the local population and those accessing increasing access to psychological therapies (IAPT) services for common mental health problems. For those engaging with the CCBT service, outcomes are equivalent to those reported in NHS‐based demonstration IAPT services. Service users highly value the service offered including the computer‐based programs and the support offered by paid and voluntary staff.

Roll out of this effective service model is recommended.

This paper has described a successful third‐sector, user‐led, CCBT self‐help clinic offering a Tier‐2 service for anxiety and depression that meets local needs. This will be of interest to service users, providers, and commissioners who want to develop similar services.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a selected bibliography of recent resources on library instruction and information literacy.

Introduces and annotates periodical articles, monographs, and audiovisual material examining library instruction and information literacy.

Provides information about each source, discusses the characteristics of current scholarship, and describes sources that contain unique scholarly contributions and quality reproductions.

The information may be used by librarians and interested parties as a quick reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.

Purpose – This chapter assesses the role of self-help groups within the emerging civil society in two transitional economies, Croatia and Slovenia, focusing on the impact of relationships with health or social care professionals and the state.

Methodology – Methods include participant observation, interviews, and document analysis of 31 groups studied intermittently from 2001 to 2007.

Findings – Self-help groups range from those three decades old to those dealing with “new social problems.” Groups, and the third sector generally, remain essentially dependent on the state. Few exist separately from formal service organizations. Those closely linked with medical institutions are challenged by state retrenchment and privatization. Others contend with funding instability, and Western models of non-profit development are expanding. Relationships with professionals are neither subservient nor independent; instead, groups act as corollaries and educators to the professional realm.

Implications, limitations, and value – Findings suggest more nuances in self-help groups' relations with the state and professionals than found in Western settings. This may illustrate both the potential and the limits of citizen involvement in new non-governmental sectors. It also demonstrates how relations between professionals and self-help groups depend on social and material relations well beyond the domain of systems of care. While specific findings cannot be generalized beyond the research settings, the study shows the importance of understanding such groups within social and political contexts. Contributions to civil society here included re-making public meanings, identities, and relations with professionalized systems. Further comparative assessment of self-help associations is essential to theory on the third sector in civil society.

In 1920 Margaret Sanger called voluntary motherhood “the key to the temple of liberty” and noted that women were “rising in fundamental revolt” to claim their right to determine their own reproductive fate (Rothman, 2000, p. 73). Decades later Barbara Katz Rothman reflected on the social, political and legal changes produced by reproductive-rights feminists since that time. She wrote: So the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1970s won, and abortion is available – just as the reproductive-rights feminists of the 1920s won, and contraception is available. But in another sense, we did not win. We did not win, could not win, because Sanger was right. What we really wanted was the fundamental revolt, the “key to the temple of liberty.” A doctor’s fitting for a diaphragm, or a clinic appointment for an abortion, is not the revolution. It is not even a woman-centered approach to reproduction (2000, p. 79).

This study aims to employ the Model of Goal-Directed Behaviour (MGB) to examine the consumer acceptance of technology-based self-service (TBSS) for a credence service instrumental to a social goal. Credence services are increasingly delivered via self-service technology and in social marketing, the achievement of social goals can be contingent on consumer acceptance of these services. However, little is known about the determinants of acceptance and extant marketing literature fails to account for emotional and goal influences which are likely to be important.

The authors interviewed 30 young adults with self-reported stress, anxiety or depression as potential users of a self-help mental health service delivered via mobile phone. The data were analysed deductively and inductively with the assistance of NVivo.

The findings generally support using the MGB to enhance understanding of consumers' acceptance of TBSS. The paper also found evidence of the importance of maintenance self-efficacy, the self-evaluation of the ability to continue using the service, and a previously ignored element of consumer level competition that arises between alternatives that achieve the same goal.

This study is the first to examine factors that influence consumers' acceptance of TBSS for credence services aimed at achieving a social goal. It builds on understanding of consumer decision making in social marketing, particularly the influence of self-efficacy and competition. It also contributes to attitudinal research by providing initial evidence for deepening and broadening the MGB in the context of TBSSs.