In the United States today, there are 2.3 million people behind bars in jails and prisons. Mass incarceration has swept up the United States to such a degree that we are known globally for holding more people in correctional facilities than any other country in the world. Although women have always, and still do, reflect a smaller proportion of the correctional population, over the last 40 years, their rates of criminalization and imprisonment have far outpaced that of men's. Drastic increases in the criminalization of women are intimately connected to the entrenchment of social disadvantage enabled under neoliberal globalization. Neoliberal transformations in the economy have contributed to women's poverty across the globe and have brought an increasing number of women into contact with the criminal justice system. The rising incarceration rate of women, and the disproportionate rate of women of color in U.S. prisons is a timely and urgent issue and one that social work is poised to address. Indeed, some of our most prominent national organizations recognize mass incarceration as an urgent issue that merits the attention of social workers. As such, it is prudent to examine social work's engagement with this issue. This study employed a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of social work scholarship in order to: 1) explore current constructions of criminalized women in social work; 2) understand the knowledge produced through such constructions; and 3) explore how that knowledge supports/shapes practice with criminalized women. Specifically, this study draws on Jäger and Maier's (2009) framework for performing a Foucauldian-inspired CDA. This approach centers Foucault's conceptualizations of discourse and the workings of power and builds on the work of Jurgen Link (1982) to examine the function of discourse in legitimizing and securing dominance. Data include a sample of 49 articles published in social work high impact journals from 2000-2018. A keyword search was performed to locate articles with an explicit focus on incarcerated/criminalized women. Only articles dealing with a U.S. context were included. Analysis occurred on two levels consisting of a structural analysis to identify initial coding schema and a detailed analysis of select articles. Detailed analysis attended to: context of text; surface of text; rhetorical means; content and ideological statements. These two levels of analysis lead to an overall synoptic analysis, or final assessment of the overall discourse. Multi-racial feminism, discourse theory, and Foucault's concept of governmentality anchored the research and provided the theoretical framework for analysis. The overarching finding is that social work high impact journals privilege a psychological discourse and that the assessment and management of risk has supplanted a holistic approach to meeting client needs and addressing mass incarceration. This, I conclude, reflects a neoliberal political climate and aligns social work with penal institutions in troubling ways. Criminalized women are overwhelmingly constructed as risky in the sample. Embedded in this construction is a strong neoliberal discourse on knowing and changing the "responsibilized" self. The implied knowledge claims that flow from these constructions rely on the use of "objective" and often depoliticized explanations for crime and criminal justice involvement. I show how this depoliticization is accomplished through a variety of neutralizing strategies, which ultimately serve to depoliticize social work itself. I highlight how, by primarily constituting criminalized women as risky, social work necessarily responds to her with individualized service delivery aimed at regulating and changing the behavior of individuals. I argue that in its reliance on practices of risk management and a preference toward micro-level service delivery, social work deploys regulatory practices that further neoliberal governance (Parton, 1998; Webb, 2003). Further, I discovered a profound ethical dissonance between social work's engagement with criminalized women and social work values. Specifically, I found that social work discourse passively accepts the logic of punishment and supports dominant ideology surrounding gender and crime while concurrently attempting to redress the consequences of such constructions through social justice values. I conceptualize this as a discursive struggle over the meaning and purpose of social work; a struggle that embodies some of the most salient historical and contemporary tensions in our field related to our professional identity and an increasing drive toward professionalization (Reisch, 2013). I argue that social work's growing dedication to practices that seek to adjust the psychological fortitude of criminalized women relies on broader cultural discourses of responsibilization, which reproduce, rather than interrupt criminalization, and divert attention away from the need for social and economic change. My analysis exposes how social work is implicated in processes of criminalization and propels a shift in emphasis from individualized service delivery, aimed at changing the behavior of individuals, to launching interventions that tackle structural injustice and inequity. Understanding the subtle and productive work of power to undermine our "good intentions" and aspirations for social justice requires us to rethink explanations for crime and our understandings regarding the purpose and necessity of the criminal justice system.

Parent-child caregiving is the most basic caregiving situation. However, parents who continue to provide care to an adult mentally retarded child have been an unexamined group of caregivers. This study compared stress levels and social support constellations among these caregivers and two other groups of parents. The study tested two major hypotheses. Parents who were caregivers for an adult child with mental retardation were predicted to report higher stress levels and smaller social support constellations than the other groups. Two comparison groups were included in the study. One group was parents of an mentally retarded child who did not live in their household. The second comparison group contained parents who had caregiving responsibilities for non-disabled children. Data were collected in two ways. The three groups of parents (N =210) responded to a survey which contained characteristics about themselves and their household, stress and their social supports. Additionally, five caregivers of a mentally retarded adult child were interviewed in the family home. Partial support was found for both the stress and social support hypotheses. Parents who were caregivers for an adult mentally retarded child reported a number of health symptoms and depressed mood items. These caregivers also reported having the fewest number of personal hours per week. Although all three groups of parents reported equal numbers of social supports, differences were found in the roles of the members of the support system and the type of exchanges in the support systems of the three groups. Implications of the research for social work practice, policy and education are presented. Suggestions about additional research on parents of mentally retarded adults are offered.

The purpose of this study is to understand how members of an urban extreme poverty neighborhood experience the labor market and how they perceive the role of social policies and institutions that attempt to facilitate or mediate employment opportunities. Residents of extreme poverty neighborhoods have been the subject of numerous public policy efforts designed to ameliorate the geographic concentration of poverty as well as strategies to promote work participation based on existing theoretical models of how work participation can be induced. It is argued that the predominant theoretical models that shape inquiry and the development of policy recommendations are incomplete and that adoption of a new orientation may offer additional insight. It is further argued that the use of a structuration perspective to guide research inquiry may extend existing knowledge and facilitate the development of responsive social policies and practice strategies (Wilson, 1995). A structuration perspective guides the researcher to analyze the labor market participation of a stigmatized group with a different lens. It recommends focusing on the individual’s perceptions of how labor market engagement is constrained and enabled by structural properties. It further recommends attending to the resiliency of individuals by examining how participants respond to such constraints: how they are navigated, how they are transformed, and how they are reproduced. The research design may best be described as an instrumental single case study using qualitative methods (Creswell, 1998). The focus of the study is the experiences of residents in one bounded community; it relies on multiple sources of data and closely attends to how the phenomenon is embedded within the social-political context. The goal of the research is to develop new understanding and build or extend theory. In-depth interviews were conducted with 25 residents, 11 community based service providers or program and policy administrators, and 1 staff person of an elected city official. A purposive sampling strategy was utilized. To increase the likelihood that diverse perspectives were captured among residents, variation was sought in employment and housing status, age, gender, and use of public benefits. An elite sampling strategy was utilized with city program administrators and service providers nominated by residents based on their identified role in the community or their capacity to provide rich information. Interviews were taped and all audiotapes were fully transcribed. Data were analyzed using Atlas.ti qualititative data analysis software. Rigor was achieved by meeting Lincoln and Guba's (1985) standards for assessing the trustworthiness of interpretive research. This study highlights constraints and how people respond to them. Residents of the extreme poverty neighborhood interviewed for this study face significant stressors and challenges simply to live safely in their neighborhood. There are a number of responses by residents to these challenges, including learning how to live within the context of those constraints, working to change those constraints for members of their community by contributing personal strengths and resources, or by trying to leave. Residents of the neighborhood also report significant employment barriers that are constraining. The residents and service providers alike respond in various ways, including trying to dismantle those barriers, managing within the context of those barriers, or giving up. Service providers and city administrators have tools to intervene but can feel similarly constrained by limited resources, lack of flexibility in how resources can be utilized, program rules and practices, and imposed outcome requirements that occasionally seem counterproductive to shared goals. In each instance, whether responding to the challenges of living within an extreme poverty neighborhood or by responding to employment barriers, residents and service providers require additional supports and resources to strengthen their existing efforts.

This research study is a descriptive study of the effectiveness of the psychiatric staffing as determined by a follow-up study of fifty-two Richmond Public School Pupils given such staffing during the l966-67 school year. The review of pertinent literature reveals what others have contributed to the knowledge of the nature and function of the school helping team. The teamwork approach, which involves the efforts of several professions and disciplines working closely together, is seen as the best present method to meet the complex, overlapping needs which have been found to affect students' learning. As a means of establishing guidelines and limits for this study, five areas of concern were defined. The questions to be answered by this study were: 1. What are the socio-economic backgrounds represented by the sample? 2. Were the recommendations made by the school psychiatrist implemented? 3. Is the overall psychiatric staffing effective according to the improvement in pupils presenting problems and the extent to which the recommendations were carried out? 4. To what extent do the available records contain sufficient information for a follow-up study? 5. What are the attitudes of the key persons responsible for the psychiatric staffing toward the effective operation of these staffings? The Pupil Personnel Services gave its approval to conduct this study. The sample numbered fifty-two. The agency requested and it was agreed that no pupil, school, or agency be contacted and that information be obtained only from the files and employees of Pupil Personnel Services. An interview schedule was constructed to elicit information to determine the extent to which the recommendations made during the psychiatric staffing were initiated and carried out. This schedule was applied to the pupil records. Open ended questions were used in interview schedules to gather pertinent information from three key persons responsible for the effective operation of the psychiatric staffing. The fifty-two pupil cases revealed the pupils to be largely from low income families, mostly males with acting-out behavior problems, and with no significant concentration from any one school. A larger percentage of the recommendations that were initiated involved the use of school resources rather than community resources. In nearly half of the pupil cases the recommendations were completely carried out, with a remaining few being carried out to a lesser extent. The findings suggested that, if the recommendations were carried out, the pupil would show behavior improvement. To a large extent the statements made by the key persons generally reflected that methods of record keeping be improved within the Department of Visiting Teachers; that there be an increase in the number and quality of the visiting teachers, especially for elementary and Junior high school placements; that parents of the pupils given psychiatric staffings become involved in the staffings and be included in the treatment process themselves; and that the visiting teacher exercise more responsibility for follow-up on the pupils given psychiatric staffing.

Part H [recently reauthorized as Part C] of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) mandates the application of family-centered practice principles to early intervention services. There has been a considerable amount of literature published in early intervention journals related to family and professional relationships in early intervention and its connection to family-centered care in early intervention services. There is very little literature, however, that examined the implementation of family-centered principles from a perspective that transcended the relationship between families and early intervention providers. This inquiry was a constructivist policy analysis of the implementation of the family-centered intent of Part H of IDEA in one Local Interagency Coordinating Council (LICC) in Virginia. Perspectives about the implementation of the family-centered intent of Part H were assessed through in-depth interviews with several stakeholder groups, including families receiving Part H early intervention services, families who were never able to access services, members of the LICC, professionals from center-based programs, professionals from home-based programs, and professionals from hospital-based programs. While data were primarily collected via in-depth interviews with participants from each stakeholder group, the inquirer also observed five LICC meetings. Document analyses and observations of LICC meetings also were used for triangulation of incoming data. Twenty-two family participants were sampled that represented variation according to socio-economic status. Twenty professional participants were sampled who represented a range of professional disciplines. Findings from this inquiry highlight some issues regarding implementation of a broad federal policy (i.e.,Part H of IDEA) at the local level. The intent of Part H was to mandate the construction of state level service delivery systems, local service delivery systems, and suggested program and professional practices for the early intervention field. Very little guidance, however, was provided to states on how to construct their systems and even less was provided on developing local early intervention service delivery systems. Few financial resources were committed for the construction of these state and local service delivery systems adding additional complications. Specifically, the legislation provided no financial support for new early intervention programs; instead, the intent was for states and local service delivery systems to coordinate already existing providers using existing funds. There are many policy and practice implications resulting from this inquiry. First, there are implications for federal, state, and local early intervention policy. Second, there are implications for early intervention practice. Third, there are implications for empowerment of families who have children receiving early intervention services. Fourth, there are implications for social work practice in the field of early intervention. Finally, there are implications for future research related to family-centered service delivery.

A correlational approach was utilized in this study to investigate the relationship between adoption related task performance and perceived quality of life of families with an adopted special-needs child. Additionally, a set of contextual variables suggested by the literature to influence family functioning with an adopted special-needs child were also studied. Purposive and availability sampling approaches were employed to identify the sample of special-needs adoptive families (N = 289) to whom a survey questionnaire was sent. Both mothers and fathers were asked to complete the Survey. Eighty-six mothers and 53 fathers completed and returned the survey questionnaire ( N: 91 families). The sample was approximately 60% Caucasian and 40% minority, primarily middle class, protestant, and with one adopted special-needs child currently living in the home. On average, the child had been in the adoptive home for 5.9 years since placement. It was found that contextual variables, rather than variables associated with task performance, were stronger predictors of perceived quality of life for both mothers and fathers. The contextual variable, stress related to parenting, emerged as the strongest predictor of lower measures of satisfaction for both mothers and fathers. In addition, for mothers, spousal support was a significant predictor of higher satisfaction with life, family life, relationship with child, and marriage. For fathers, the adoption related task, participating in adoptive family reunions, was a significant predictor of higher family life satisfaction. It was suggested that social workers can take a role in implementing services that help adoptive parents cope with stress, and enhance their opportunities for increased socialization with other adopters. Policies and services which ultimately enhance the adoptive family's sense of competence through such activities as these should be developed, funded, and implemented.

The current study investigated family, individual and sibling relationship variables of adult sibling loss, using a cross-sectional survey design. A purposive sampling procedure was used to recruit adult subjects that had experienced the death of an adult sibling within the last five years. Ninety-four subjects responded to the initial request with 84 subjects returning questionnaires for an 89% response rate. Family variables of communication, cohesion, and adaptability and individual variables of individuation, self esteem as well as level of grief were operationalized using standardized instruments through a mailed questionnaire. It was predicted that significant relationships would be found between family variables and current level of grief. It was also predicted that individual characteristics (individuation, self esteem, church attendance, and cause of death) would be significantly related to the level of grief. Characteristics of the sibling relationship (frequency of contact, communication, perceived emotional closeness, geographical proximity, age differential and same sex) were predicted to reveal significant relationships. Bivariate analysis yielded support for only four of the sixteen hypotheses. No family variables were related to the subjects’ level of grief at the time of the survey. The individual characteristics of individuation, self esteem and church attendance were all significantly related to the level of grief. Support was also found for the sibling relationship variable of geographical proximity with level of grief. Multivariate regression analysis was used in testing two models that investigated demographic, family, individual and sibling relationship variables with current level of grief. The first model included all variables that were statistically significant at the bivariate level and relevant demographic variables. In addition, the level of grief at death and the amount of time since death were included in the model. The level of grief at death was the strongest predictor of current level of grief. The first model explained 61.7% of the variability of current level of grief. The second model selected those variables that had significant t-values from the first model. The level of emotional involvement was the strongest predictor of the level of grief at death. This model explained 58% of the variability of current level of grief. The level of grief at death was the strongest predictor of the current level of grief in both models.

In an effort to examine social organizational structures and support systems in the social world of the older lesbian woman, 73 self-identified lesbian women fifty years of age or older provided data on their personal interactions with the economic, political, educational, religious, social welfare and familial social systems of the heterosexual culture and the homosexual subculture. Results from this cross-sectional survey depict the sample as well educated, professional, financially secure, politically liberal women in good health who are selective with whom they reveal their sexual orientation. The knowledge of their lesbianism is shared more with female friends than with family members. While they are not terribly active members of the homosexual community, they are members of politically oriented and/or professionally related organizations. Although they utilize a variety of "helping" professionals, most reveal their sexual orientation to these professionals only if it is relevant to the helping process. Those sampled consider their formal education, ability to earn an adequate income, relationships with both heterosexuals and homosexuals and political activities important. They are involved with the heterosexual culture that provides them an education and a professional life as well as the homosexual subculture that provides them personal relationships and support. The women sampled seek and get support in times of personal crisis from those who are aware of the older lesbian's sexual orientation. This includes primarily homosexual and heterosexual women friends and some immediate family members, but rarely men. The religious institution is not viewed as a place to seek support, and the economic institution is perceived as an acceptable place to be professionally employed, but is not generally utilized in times of financial crisis. The formal educational system and the political system are not particularly supportive of the lesbian lifestyle, and the social welfare system may or may not provide the older lesbian needed support in times of personal crisis. In sum, it is primarily within the context of relationships with other women that those surveyed gain support in times of crisis.

People with end-stage renal disease have higher rates of mental health diagnoses due to sudden changes in health status, lack of effective support systems, and diminished survival rates. The purpose of this action research study, and research question posed, centered on how dialysis clinical social workers perceive their roles in providing consultation to the interdisciplinary team members on how to identify and respond to patients with mental illnesses. An interview guide was used to gather data by facilitating 3 focus groups with 7 dialysis social workers in a rural town in Texas. The theory of planned behavior was used to inform clinical social workers' understanding of their roles and responsibilities when interfacing with patients displaying symptoms of mental illnesses. A thematic analysis coding technique was used to analyze the data collected. Solutions explored included (a) increasing education efforts with interdisciplinary team members on the importance of consulting with the social worker on ways to identify and respond to patients with mental illnesses, and (b) ways to increase teammate support within the dialysis setting. This study clarifies dialysis social workers' roles and responsibilities when responding to dialysis patients with mental illnesses and guides them to enhance the capacity of the multidisciplinary dialysis team by improving inter-professional communication. The implications for social change through enhanced continuing education efforts designed to increase social work engagement and effective communication strategies within interdisciplinary teams are discussed. These social change efforts aim to enhance the overall wellbeing of dialysis patients with co-occurring mental health illnesses in rural settings.

Offenders return to the community after having been sexually abused by those who have been entrusted with the responsibility to protect them. The phenomenon of staff-on-inmate sexual abuse has become problematic within the criminal justice system. Research on the topic of sexual abuse in penal institutions reveals a lack of information pertaining to staff-on-inmate sexual abuse, and how correctional workers are trained in that area. Female correctional staff have been implicated in more incidences of staff-on-inmate sexual abuse than their male counterparts. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore sexual abuse training received by female correctional staff who were employed in a Mid Atlantic pre-release center, and to examine their perceptions of that training. The study was centered around the Thomas Theorem adopted by William Isaac Thomas. That theory postulates that an individuals' actions are based on how they perceive a situation. Two research questions were addressed relating to sexual abuse training and perceptions of training. Semi-structured interviews were conducted which provided participants with an opportunity to express and describe new ideas relating to the topic. Data were analyzed using the Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis system because of its ability to address subjectivity. This research has revealed that sexual abuse training is developed for correctional staff as a collective and does not differentiate with respect to gender. In addition, it was concluded that correctional staff sexual abuse training lacks intensity and depth in terms of information disseminated. The results of this research will provide criminal justice scholars with information that could prove useful in future studies on the topic of staff -on-inmate sexual abuse.