Abstract
The purpose of this study is to reveal the factors and structures which exist in the process of forming the meaning of illness through the narratives of those afflicted with schizophrenia. I conducted the unstructured interviews based on the life history method with 2 men with schizophrenia. I reconstructed and analyzed the narratives based on the concept of "suffering", emerging from the framework Arthur Kleiman developed. Through the analysis, I found 5 factors affecting the formation of the meaning of illness. These include "the individual's worldview", "the basic way of life", "the attitude toward social conditions", "the process of accepting the illness", and "the what-if story". In short, the meaning of illness is influenced by the "former life" before illness. In other words, each person's worldview, which has shaped each life, strongly influences how they accept their illness and what meaning they find in the illness. Specifically, each person develops their meaning of illness through dialogue with their own worldviews, whenever they confront various issues including illness. In conclusion, this paper proposes that nursing staff can better understand their patients by listening eagerly to their worldviews and by dealing with their fears of illness as well as with the illness itself, and duly provide patient-friendly care for each patient.
