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Thesis advisor: Kevin J. Mahoney / Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) older adults in the U.S. face disproportionate risk of increased health and mental health problems as compared to their non-LGBT counterparts. Experiences of harassment, discrimination, and violence due to sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) contribute to the chronic stresses associated with being a sexual and/or gender minority. LGBT older adults may avoid or delay needed services in later life, rendering them invisible to health care providers (HCPs) if they do not disclose SOGI and if providers do not ask. This three-paper dissertation explored LGBT older adults' invisibility and outness in aging services. Paper 1 investigated gerontological social workers' biopsychosocial assessment practices to understand how they became aware of clients' SOGI; assessment forms were analyzed and qualitative interviews with social workers were conducted, showing that social workers did not have a systematic way of learning about clients' SOGI. Paper 2 was a quantitative analysis of survey data from 129 LGBT older adults that showed an association between experiences of SOGI-based discrimination/violence after age 50 and not disclosing SOGI to HCPs and having avoided using aging services for fear of coming or being out. Paper 3 was a qualitative analysis of interviews with 22 LGBT older adults that sought to understand how they disclosed SOGI to HCPs. Those who disclosed did so without being asked, because of health conditions, after having sought out an LGBT /LGBT-friendly provider, or after being asked about their sex and/or love lives. Paper 3 findings offered practice and environmental changes that could increase LGBT older adults' SOGI disclosure to HCPs. This dissertation provides suggestions for social work policy, practice, and research aimed at supporting gerontological social workers in learning about their clients' SOGI in an effort to address health disparities among LGBT older adults / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Social Work. / Discipline: Social Work.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University / It is the purpose of this study to examine, describe, and compare the functions of two corner-group workers a female social worker working with a girls' corner-group and a male social worker working with a boys' corner-group. This topic is related to the research goals of the Special Youth Program, the agency from which the data have been drawn and within whose frame-work the research design has been fashioned.

"April 2004." / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 583-599). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese.

Thesis (M.A. (Social Work)) --University of Limpopo, 2018 / This paper examines factors militating against social workers’ endeavours to undertake postgraduate studies. The model of Maintaining Professional Competence was considered to guide the study with a sample of ten (10) participants who were all interviewed face-to-face in Driekop (Sekhukhune District), Limpopo Province (RSA). An interview guide was utilised in the foregoing. Content Thematic Analysis was used to make sense of the findings. The findings indicate that social workers’ aspirations to improve their qualifications are hampered by the following impediments: heavy workloads and family commitments; financial constraints due to meagre remuneration; lack of motivation and poor prestige of the profession fueled by little or no consideration of postgraduate qualifications by employers; and poor reading habits and lack of information on postgraduate sponsors. Despite the aforementioned barriers, social workers acknowledged the value of postgraduate education in their lives. Given these findings, the researcher recommends that: • Postgraduate qualifications in social work need to be incentivised. • Social work salaries need to be improved/commensurate with qualifications, and competitive incentives provided as well. • Social workers’ heavy workloads need to be reviewed. • Social workers need to make efforts to inculcate reading habits amongst themselves. • Social workers must strive to balance work and family commitments to make time for further studies. • Social workers as well as their employers should seek or source scholarships for post-graduate studies.

Within the social work profession, there is a lack of understanding about self-care practices of social workers working with older adults. This lack of knowledge is a concern for the profession because as the older adult population continues to grow, so will the need for social workers to address their needs. Using action research, a focus group of 7 female social workers working with older adults in the Pacific Northwest discussed the research questions related to their use of self-care practices and identifying strategies to increase the use of self-care. Self-compassion theory enhanced understanding the relationship between social workers' experiences with older adult clients and self-care. Coding protocols were used to analyze the data. Key findings provided a further understanding of the self-care practices of these social workers including the use of appropriate boundaries, effective communication, education about responsibilities and expectations, and advocacy regarding the need for self-care. Additional strategies to increase self-care involved mindfulness about job roles, primarily related to team and system barriers. Recommendations from this project included adding self-care to education and training in social work courses required for degrees, licensure renewal, and employment-based continuing education courses. By exploring self-care practices of social workers working with older adults, the findings of this study may bring about social change by increasing the awareness of current and future social workers about the importance of self-care and providing strategies that enable social workers to implement self-care.

This study reports the results of an exploratory factor analysis conducted to analyze the reliability of a pilot instrument created to evaluate social workers’ attitudes toward LGBT youth in the foster care system. The sample (n = 60) included social workers, supervisors, and staff from the County of San Bernardino Children and Family Services. Data were collected from February 2011 to March 2011. A two factor solution yielded the best results; Chronbach’s alpha for factor one yielded a strong result for internal consistency reliability (α = .777) and for factor two yielded a less strong result (α = .628). Strategies are recommended to increase the reliability and evaluate the validity of the measure in future.

This research was conducted to study the beliefs about fatherhood among social workers. Data for this project were gathered through separate interviews which were conducted using a sample of five individual social workers that worked with children and families. The participants were asked a series of questions regarding their beliefs about fatherhood. Ultimately, this study found that social workers believe that fathers are important and can contribute to their children’s lives in a healthy manner through emotional, educational, and financial support. The results from this study suggest that fathers play an important role in their children’s lives and greatly contribute to their emotional, mental, financial, educational, health, and overall well being. This study also suggests that though fathers are held in high regard by the social workers in this research study, there is still a pressing need for resources and programs for fathers that support the father/child relationship. Finally, suggestions for future study include the need for quality programs focused on the needs of fathers, training for staff to involve and engage fathers, and to identify the barriers obstructing father involvement.

This project explores the barriers to reunification with their children for incarcerated mothers in an effort to provide more support to child welfare social workers who engage with this population. Project participants were selected from one regional office of a child welfare agency in Southern California to complete qualitative interviews. Participants included seven Social Service Practitioners (SSPs), two Supervising Social Service Practitioners (SSSPs), and one Data Analysist. Each participant’s interview was digitally recorded, transcribed, and analyzed following the systematic manual coding method with the assistance of Microsoft Word (Ose, S, 2016). Five common barriers were identified: child visitations with incarcerated parents, variances of social worker’s knowledge of services and programs provided by institutions, presence of guidance and support, maintaining contact with incarcerated parents, and length of sentence. At the conclusion of the project, the researcher provided findings to study participants and the Deputy Director of the child welfare agency.

The discussion of spirituality and religion (S/R) in social work is a prevalent topic within the field. Literature suggests that social workers do not feel competent or comfortable discussing or utilizing S/R in practice. This study focused on identifying factors that may be causing resistance in social workers from the Inland Empire of Southern California towards addressing S/R with their clients. The researchers interviewed eight social workers from diverse areas of practice via telephone and in-person. Data was collected via audio-recording and later transcribed for thematic analysis. Participants were asked an array of questions including their own experience with their spirituality and current comfort level with asking their clients about S/R. Through the findings, it appears that social workers’ comfort level stems from various aspects including a sense of unease regarding their knowledge on various belief systems. The results indicated that once clients are asked about their spiritual and/or religious beliefs, clients are able to engage in a discussion about their definition of their own beliefs and determine the direction of the topic.