Brian J. Stevenson

• PhD
• Clinical Research Psychologist at U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Severe Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) has been identified as a significant impediment to employment. However, little is known about correlates of employment recovery after a period of not working among veterans with severe PTSD treated in specialized intensive treatment programs. This study examines rates and correlates of transitioning from...

Veterans with mental health and substance use conditions have poor employment outcomes and would likely benefit from integrated career, mental health, and substance use related interventions. However, vocational psychology has overlooked this vulnerable population, and vocational interventions are often relegated as less important than other psycho...

Background: Veterans with psychiatric disorders want additional career development services to support their recovery and pursuit of meaningful employment. However, no career counseling programs have been designed for this specific population. We developed the Purposeful Pathways intervention to fill this need. Objective: This study protocol aim...

The purpose of this study was to describe the development of a new intervention for jobseekers and to assess its efficacy using a naturalistic, pre-post intervention design. In contrast to existing work-based interventions, the Work Intervention Network (WIN) intervention targets multiple intersecting domains through four modules and via six group...

The high incidence of untreated mental health concerns among veterans can harm other areas of life, including employment. Loss of employment can lead to other adverse outcomes, such as financial instability, functional decline, and increased risk for suicide. Current Veterans Health Administration (VHA) vocational services are limited in that they...

Veterans who are unemployed and living with mental health or substance use conditions are in need of integrative interventions that support their career development, mental wellness, and sobriety. However, career development interventions are often developed and implemented separate from mental health services. This paper introduces a novel interve...

BACKGROUND Veterans with psychiatric disorders want additional career development services to support their recovery and pursuit of meaningful employment. However, no career counseling programs have been designed for this specific population. We developed the Purposeful Pathways intervention to fill this need. OBJECTIVE This study protocol aims to...

The aim of the current study was to examine whether the key constructs targeted in the Work Intervention Network (WIN) intervention uniquely predicted well-being outcomes and mediated relations between un/underemployment and these outcomes. Using data from a sample of 462 adults in the U.S., we positioned employment status as a predictor of life sa...

Veterans living with mental health conditions have ambitious career goals and want support to find employment that meets their interests and preferences. Despite calls from researchers to “invest” and “commit” to career development research and practice for individuals living with psychiatric conditions, we still do not have empirically tested mode...

Veterans living with mental health conditions have ambitious career goals and want support to find employment that meets their interests and preferences. Despite calls from researchers to “invest” and “commit” to career development research and practice for individuals living with psychiatric conditions, we still do not have empirically tested mode...

The concept of recovery has become an increasingly common framework for organizing mental health care, thus many psychologists find themselves working in settings that espouse a recovery orientation to service delivery. However, the concepts of recovery and recovery-oriented services are complex and have many definitions and psychologists struggle...

Increasing social connection and access to care has been found to decrease the rate of suicide in U.S. veterans. The Veteran Outreach Into the Community to Expand Social Support (VOICES) is an intervention developed by Department Veteran Affairs (VA) staff to improve social connection and provide information about services by implementing community...

Objective: This article presents the argument that all veterans engaged in substance use treatment, regardless of current or recent use, should be allowed access to vocational services through Veterans Affairs (VA). This argument is presented as a commentary to Cosottile and DeFulio (2020), who argue for the VA to restrict veteran’s access to work...

BACKGROUND:No studies have examined vocational identity among individuals with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders. OBJECTIVE:Influenced by Blustein’s relational theory of working (2011), this study examined the relationships between several social-environmental variables (external/relational conflicts, employment barriers, subst...

BACKGROUND: Increased intensity in job-search behavior is associated with important employment outcomes like job attainment. There is evidence that work hope, and career adaptability are important antecedents of higher job-search intensity. However, there is no evidence that these relationships exist among individuals living with serious mental ill...

Providing career development services, through career counseling and assessment, is part of vocational rehabilitation programming. However, there is no applied evidence that such career development services are feasible or accepted among individuals with psychiatric disorders. We examined feasibility (acceptability, demand, and perceived need) of t...

Veterans face a range of challenges as they transition out of the military and into civilian life. For some, this period of transition is characterized by loss of identity, loss of daily structure, loss of community, and confusion about where they fit within society. If not attended to, problems associated with the military‐to‐civilian transition c...

This study sought to develop and validate the Employment Flexibility Scale (EFS) – an instrument aimed at measuring one’s willingness to accept employment options that may be perceived as inadequate by a job-seeker. Two studies (N = 204, N = 123) were undertaken using two different samples of recent college graduates to conduct reliability and vali...

Former foster youth often experience difficulty finding and maintaining employment as they emancipate from state care. Research highlights this fact by consistently reporting on the bleak employment outcomes of former foster youth; however, virtually no studies have given practical guidance to practitioners on how to develop interventions. This art...

This paper describes a social justice informed, formative evaluation of a community-based intervention program in our community that paired marginalized Latinx youth and Holocaust survivor mentors. This program is a unique effort to address the issues facing this youth population through difficult dialogues and mentorship from a group who has clear...