In this thesis by published work nine works are presented, prefaced by a Critical Summary and Review which discusses the genesis of the work and its theoretical presuppositions, and evaluates their contribution to knowledge. The work includes both sole-authored and collaborative writing. This published work adopts a social constructionist approach to knowledge in health and welfare. The first work explores critical approaches to child development and their relevance to professional practice. Subsequent work adopts a post-Wittgensteinian approach to language as practical activity, exploring how practitioners such as social workers and nurses do 'case work1 , making knowledge about people, events and situations in their talk and writing and, in doing so, enact the institutional order. An exploration of the ways in which practitioners construct their practice in reflective writing is a significant focus within several pieces of work. Attention is paid to what social actors (patients/service users and professionals) do in their interactions and communicative practices. Thus, talk and text are not treated as simple vehicles for conveying literal, factual descriptions but as the means by which moral adequacy is portrayed and authentic versions of events are established. These analyses draw inspiration from a variety of sources including micro sociology, discursive psychology and narrative analysis, emphasizing the practical-moral aspects of health and welfare practice in which the production of identity, for example as a caring practitioner, plays a key part. The published work has a strong practice orientation and the implications for professional education are highlighted throughout. 'Reflexive awareness' is promoted as a means by which health and welfare VIprofessionals may challenges tendencies to take practice for granted. By engaging in the processes of making the familiar strange, it is argued that better understandings of practice can be achieved and a stance of 'respectful uncertainty' deployed.

M.A. (Social Work) / Stress is a well-known phenomenon in our everyday lives, and has a serious impact on our personal and social functioning. Stress is experienced by almost all individuals, especially in their work-environment, and has a huge impact on their functioning, motivation, performance, colleagues and even clients. Within the Department of Social Development there is a lot of red tape, challenges and situations that create stress for the employees on an ongoing basis. If these situations are not handled and managed correctly and effectively through successful stress management, intervention methods, and also support systems, it can prove detrimental to employees on the level of service delivery. Within the Department of Social Development, social workers are irreplaceable in their roles, as they fulfil the core functions of the Department. They are responsible for the social work services to clients and the public, and also all other duties that go hand in hand in improving their clients’ social functioning. Observations by the researcher in her own work environment (Ekurhuleni region) showed that social workers and other employees are overworked and stressed out, and sick leave is taken regularly for stress-related problems. Some of the current workplace trends have been determined in a pre-study by the author during March/April 2008 (Maré, 2008). The reason for the study was to determine if social workers in the Ekurhuleni Region experience negative stress, and if it is related to their work. The aim was to discover if the source of their stress is work-related, and if they can successfully cope with this work-related stress and deal with it. The researcher is a social worker in the Ekurhuleni Region and has been in the position of having to cope with tremendous work-related stress in conditions which made coping with it difficult. With this study, the researcher wanted to investigate the stress experience of social workers and their way of coping with it, in order to develop guidelines from the results that would assist the social workers in effectively handling their work-related stress. These guidelines should not only improve the functioning of the social workers, but also impact positively on the service delivery of the organisation. Social work is a helping profession in which social workers draws from themselves to be able to assist clients with their problems and stress. This in itself can turn out to be a stressful situation, as social workers ignore their own stress through focusing on the client. The social worker’s own functioning is not as important as the client’s, and therefore the social worker’s needs are forgotten or ignored. The researcher hopes that with this study a positive contribution will be made in understanding the needs of the helper, instead of only focusing on the helpless.

M.A. (Social Work) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / The Wellness Leadership White Paper states that leadership is needed in a supportive environment with the purpose of guiding clients to lasting wellness. Wellness can be defined as an active process that enables an individual to become aware of all aspects of the self and to make choices in terms of a more healthy existence by means of balancing and integrating various life dimensions. Health care professionals are leaders who play an important role in creating an environment that contributes to wellness. Their leadership is, therefore, viewed as a wellness strategy. Leadership has been identified as an essential role of health care professionals with a responsibility to attend to the needs of their clients, such as youth victims of violence, with the aim of leading them towards wellness. The Provincial Nursing Strategy of the Western Cape in South Africa emphasises the need for health care professionals to demonstrate their leadership capacity in practice. In the communities of the Western Cape Province of South Africa, many youth victims of violence report for treatment at the health care facilities; it places a high burden on the health care system. Even though health care professionals provide treatment to this group of youth, it is not clear how health care professionals lead them towards wellness after an incidence of violence. The purpose of this study was to develop a conceptual framework that can be implemented by health care professionals to gain a better understanding about the important role they play in leading youth victims of violence towards wellness in a rural community in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. This research study applied a qualitative, exploratory, descriptive and contextual design. The study population who were selected by means of a purposive sampling technique consisted of youth attending a high school and who had been victims of violence and of health care professionals (professional nurses, medical doctors and social workers) working at the health care facilities in the community where the study was conducted. The study was conducted in four phases. Phase 1 of the study focused on the exploration and description of the expectations of the youth victims of violence about how health care professionals should lead them towards wellness. Focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted at a high school at the study site. Phase 2 explored and described the experiences of health care professionals who were supporting youth victims of violence at the health care facilities in the community of study. The execution of this phase comprised of unstructured individual interviews. The total number of the FGDs and unstructured individual interviews conducted in this study was determined by data saturation. Data analysis of the data collected involved transcription of the voice recordings of the all the interviews and writing up of field notes. The steps of Tesch’s coding technique were used at the end of Phases 1 and 2. To ensure trustworthiness of the collected data, Guba and Lincoln’s strategies of credibility, transferability, dependability, confirmability and authenticity were applied. Phase 3 of this study entailed the development of a conceptual framework for health care professionals to lead youth victims of violence towards wellness. It was based on the findings from Phases 1 and 2 of the study; Phase 4 of the study involved peer debriefing and validation of the developed conceptual framework. In Phase 1 of the study, a total of nine (n = 9) FGDs were conducted among fifty eight (n = 58) youth participants between the ages of 15 and 19 years. Each group consisted of 6 to 8 participants and the interviews did not last more than an hour per session. The data analysis in this phase showed that the youth victims of violence did have expectations from the health care professionals in guiding them towards wellness. They shared their interpretation of the term wellness and were also quite aware of the challenges in their community. Four categories emerged from the data in Phase 1: Category 1 - Dimensions of wellness as it related to healthy body, mind, spirit and positive interactions: The findings of this category revealed that youth participants described wellness as a holistic concept that comprised healthy living, self-care and a healthy personality and mind (emotional, psychological) as well as spiritual well-being. They did not necessarily consider wellness as the absence of sickness or illness, Category 2 - Common problems among youth in the context of the community: They articulated that drug abuse, teenage pregnancy and violent behaviour were important issues of concern to them in their community. Category 3 – Building a sound and trusting relationship: They expressed their need for health care professionals to have a positive attitude towards them, to be respectful and to provide them with accurate information, as well as confidential and supportive services. Category 4 - Guidance of youth to wellness: The youth also proposed strategies that they believe could be used by the health care professionals while guiding them towards wellness. These strategies were: Provision of information / health education, school and community outreach programmes, provision of counselling services and role modelling. For the second phase, seven (n = 7) health care professionals were interviewed. Two (n = 2) were professional nurses, three (n = 3) medical doctors and two (n = 2) social workers. The findings of the individual interviews indicated that the health care professionals recognised the fact that wellness is very important. However, they felt that guiding youth victims of violence toward wellness was a challenging process. Three categories emerged from the data in Phase 2: Category 1 - Different points of view about the concept of wellness: The health care professionals described wellness as the holistic wellbeing of a person, an absence of illness or disease and living a healthy lifestyle. Category 2 - Barriers to leading youth victims of violence towards wellness: The health care professionals reported challenges while attempting to lead youth victims of violence towards wellness which included low socioeconomic status of families, unsupervised youth, violent behaviour, drug and substance abuse, a lack of resources in the community, negative staff attitudes, inadequate physical infrastructure and human resources as well as the absence of a process of guiding youth victims to wellness. Category 3 - Guidance to leading youth victims to wellness: The health care workers proposed strategies for guiding youth victims towards wellness. Those strategies included the provision of support in the form of counselling services, use of support groups, family and community support; recreational activities, dedicated staff to work with youth victims of violence and a multidisciplinary team approach. The findings from the first two phases were triangulated during the third phase of this study with the purpose of developing a conceptual framework. The survey list of Dickoff, James and Wiedenbach formed the foundation of the reasoning map for the development of the framework. The unique contribution of this study is the development of an original, participative leadership framework that provides health care professionals with information for leading youth victims of violence towards wellness in a rural community in the Western Cape. This study was conducted in a single rural community of the Western Cape Province of South Africa. Despite this limitation, the framework could be evaluated for use in similar settings. Finally, guidelines to implement the framework and recommendations for improving community health care practice, nursing education and nursing research were suggested based on the findings from the study.

The evaluation of social worker performance is a problem that frequently confronts the social work profession because the profession continually seeks to discover what it is doing for, and with, the clients it serves in order to learn how to serve them better. A number of studies of effect have been launched to this end. The Area Development Project of Vancouver, British Columbia, is one such study. The project seeks to test a specific treatment method, "integrated family services", on a selected group of one hundred multi-problem families. The experimental design calls for one hundred families in the treatment group and two hundred families in two control groups in order to test the hypothesis that the demonstrating services of the project are more effective in improving the functioning of families with complex problems than the "usual agency services" of health and welfare agencies. Studies of effect on casework services too often assume that there is no significant variation in the performances of professionally trained social workers when there is little reason to believe this to be the case. This study, which was carried out in conjunction with the Area Development Project, aimed at developing a Q-sort measure of family centered casework performance that could be used to test the hypothesis that there are significant differences between the inputs of professionally trained social workers. The proposed instrument would also document any differences between social worker performances should the hypothesis prove true. The completed Q-sort of Family Centered Casework Performance was applied to the Area Development Projects' treatment group social workers to generate a performance score for each of the workers as well as a profile description of the ideal family centered casework performance. It was possible to demonstrate that the inputs of the social workers differed greatly, while at the same time develop a precise profile description of the projects' "integrated family services". The study also attempted to relate the performance levels of the treatment group social workers to client movement in the cases that the workers carried. The establishment of a definite conclusion in regard to this relationship was not possible because of limitations in time and data, however, a means of analysis was developed for use with final data from the Area Development Project when it becomes available. The introductory chapter gives a brief summary of the problem of social worker evaluation, alternative ways of dealing with the problem and a statement of the scope and limitations of the study. The Theoretical framework of the study and the methods utilized are outlined in Chapter II. In Chapter III, the study findings are presented along with descriptive data on the study sample. The thesis concludes with a brief summary of the study and its' conclusions followed by some proposals for dealing with final data on client movement when they become available. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

Professional education leading to a Master of Social Work degree has been offered at the University of British Columbia since 1945. In this period of time, more than 350 people have been awarded this Masters' degree. A large majority of these people have been caseworkers, while a minority have been groupworkers. There are two major focuses of this study. The first is a descriptive survey of the graduates for the purpose of gaining background and professional information. The second focus of this study is a comparative analysis of the caseworkers and groupworkers, with particular emphasis on vertical and horizontal mobility and on the factor of genericism. From the information which was obtained in a mailed questionnaire, many similarities and differences were identified between the caseworkers and the groupworkers. They indicated basically similar, patterns of upward social and professional mobility. Caseworkers and groupworkers have similar experiences in regard to such aspects of their profession as number of jobs held, number of settings in which they have practiced, length of time spent in one position, and geographical locations of their jobs. There are a number of interesting differences in the patterns of vertical mobility experienced by caseworkers and groupworkers, for example, a much higher percentage of group-workers than caseworkers entered supervisory and administrative positions in their first job after M.S.W. graduation. The section on genericism first outlines the three perspectives from which the concept can be viewed. A "generic" practitioner is operationally defined as one who spends not more than 80% of his time engaged in one method and at least 10% engaged in a second method. Fairly large numbers of both caseworkers and groupworkers were found to be generic Social Workers, but a significantly higher percentage of groupworkers than caseworkers could be so considered. Conclusions are drawn from the findings on mobility and genericism and possible implications are drawn for training and for the field. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

This thesis explores the relationship between work environment and burnout by examining the question: Do workers experiencing burnout see their work environment more negatively than co-workers who are not burned-out? The goal is to explore the potential usefulness of measures of work environment and burnout to guide efforts at burnout intervention and prevention. Thirty-nine family and childcare workers from five sites in the Vancouver area responded to a survey to test hypotheses addressing this question. The work environment and burnout were found to be highly interactive with the work environment variables of supervisor support and clarity identified as key factors in burnout. The Maslach Burnout Inventory and Moos (1981) Work Environment Scale were found to be useful instruments for intervention and future research. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

Masters in Public Administration - MPA / Public service motivation refers to individuals’ with a predisposition to perform public service for largely altruistic motives in public institutions. The purpose of this study was to investigate what public service motivation (PSM) meant to state-employed social workers in the South African context. In gaining insight into PSM amongst social workers in the public sector, my objectives were to explore the value social workers place on intrinsic rewards, the reasons why participants entered the profession, and what social workers’ self-perceptions of their role was as public servants and what public service meant for their own identities. This qualitative study was conducted in the Western Cape with state-employed social workers. The social workers were selected using snowball sampling. Participants varied in age, years of experience as social workers, gender, and race. Data for this study was based on in-depth, semi-structured interviews. With public service motivation being an under-researched subject in the South African context, an open-ended inquiry into the important variables that influence PSM in the local context was followed. This approach will inform ways in which PSM could be measured in the future in the South African context. The results of my study indicate that social workers were attracted to public sector employment because it offered the greatest extrinsic incentives – higher salaries, medical aid benefits, and a housing subsidy, compared to NGO’s in the private sector. This finding challenges the widely accepted notion in PSM literature that social workers place more value on intrinsic reward than extrinsic rewards. Extrinsic reward refers to financial or other tangible incentives. The data further revealed that participants were willing to leave the social work profession and exit public service for employment opportunities that offered them greater support from superiors, and remuneration that acknowledged their academic qualifications. Poor remuneration adversely affected participants’ feeling of job satisfaction and motivation to perform their duties. Politics has played a seminal role in shaping the quality, and the denying of public service to certain categories of citizens.

The purpose of this study was to examine forensic social workers' levels of knowledge about skepticism toward Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) in light of the controversy that surrounds the diagnosis. Relationships between demographic and professional practice variables and workers' levels of knowledge and skepticism were analyzed to assess the possible etiology of skepticism toward DID.

The aim of this study was to examine the social workers experience and their thoughts about their work with elderly clients who suffers from an alcohol addiction. More specifically was to find out how the social workers themselves look upon their own competence in the work with this type of clients. We also wanted to find out how their cooperation with other authorities looks like in Malmö Stad. Our research questions were:•What experiences and thoughts do social workers have about their work with elderly people with alcohol addiction?•What are the social workers experiencing when it comes to collaboration with other authorities in their work with elderly clients with alcohol addiction?All six of our informants has volunteered to be a part of our study. The interviews are based on a semi structured model with open questions. The results of our study are that alcohol addiction is a problem that is hard to talk about and just because you are getting older does not mean that the problem is getting smaller. It is a problem that is getting more and more common among the ageing population and we need more research to be able to come up with social efforts that will meet this problem.