ABSTRACT The social atmosphere and possibility of guided activities clients with mental disabilities in CR and USA Finding out and contrasting a social atmosphere within the facilities in the Czech Republic (CR) and the USA as well as the possibilities of guided activities in there was the main objective of this thesis. The objective was met by observing the social atmosphere in organizations and analysing the responds of a questionnaire concerning the atmosphere. Following an interview with the facility{\crq}s management it can be stated that the American organization Road To Responsibility, Inc. does not offer 9 activities out of 36 referred to in the questionnaire (25%). On the other hand, Czech organizations do not make available 2 activities out of 36 activities listed in the questionnaire (5.5%). It can be therefore assumed that the hypothesis H1 - The US facilities provide a more extensive range of guided activities than the Czech ones - was NOT CONFIRMED. The questionnaire enquiries concerning the nature of the social atmosphere in organizations resulted in 10 points for the Czech ones as opposed to 12 points for those in the USA. Consequently, it can be stated that the hypothesis H2 - The awareness of the social atmosphere throughout the American Home Group system is higher than in the Czech facilities - was CONFIRMED. The research results concerning the H2 confirm that the US organizations look after their employees much more than in the CR. The Home Group system is similar to nursing homes in the CR. However, clients of all types and degrees of disability live there unlike in the CR. The Home Group{\crq}s task is to integrate disabled people into the society and afford them the opportunity to live a life most similar to a normal family life. The Home Group{\crq} houses are a part of a regular housing development and are not in any way separated. The life of American clients is more similar to the life of the intact population than the life of the Czech clients. In the CR, the clients are still considered sick patients who must be taken care of and be treated. The American clients do not meet medical therapies in such a way like in the CR and they are much more included in life similar to the life of the intact population. The Czech clients can satisfy most of their needs within the organization, therefore they do not feel the need to get out of the organization into the environment of majority population.

Partindo de uma abordagem da figura polêmica da loucura como domínio estratégico de inúmeras relações de poder que não majoritariamente orientadas por princípios restritivos, esta dissertação enfoca a produção do sujeito “usuário” em um NAPS (Núcleo de Atenção Psicossocial) – instituição pública de saúde mental vinculada ao movimento da Luta Antimanicomial. Para tanto, transcrições de entrevistas com os usuários foram analisadas segundo o método de análise institucional de discurso. Visou-se, com isso, ao estudo da constituição do sujeito no discurso – o que implica tanto o seu vínculo com a instituição quanto a interlocução que se configura com o entrevistador no ato mesmo da entrevista. Empreendendo uma analítica do discurso do usuário – em detrimento de classificações psiquiátricas ou psicopatológicas impostas aos sujeitos –, realizou-se o delineamento de singularidades por meio da positivação desses discursos. Por fim, confrontando as análises das entrevistas, buscou-se mapear as regularidades discursivas e as diversas correlações de força. Temas como violência, médicos, sexualidade, medicamentos e cotidiano institucional são abordados nesta pesquisa, sempre tendo por base o discurso dos usuários. / Starting with an approach of the controversial image of insanity as a controlling strategy of various power relationships, which are not mostly guided by restrictive principles, this dissertation focuses on the subject’s production, a user in a NAPS (Social and Psychological Attention Centre) – public institution of mental care, which is linked to the “Anti-Mental Hospital” fight. Therefore, transcriptions of users’ interviews were analyzed according to the institutional discourse analysis method. For the objective of studying the subject’s constitution in the discourse – which implies its relation to the institution and the conversation configured with the interviewer during the interview. Applying the user’s discourse analysis – in disregard of psychiatric or psychopathological categories imposed on the subjects – was made the outline of singularities through the assertiveness of those discourses. At last, comparing the interviews’ analyses, we intended to map discourse regularities and various power correlations. Topics like violence, medicals, sexuality, medicine and institutional daily life are always approached in this research, keeping the users’ discourse as support.

The aim of this study was to examine the concept of “integration” within residential care homes for unaccompanied children. More specifically its aim was to find out how the social workers themselves within residential care homes for unaccompanied children understand the concept of integration and how they work for it. The study was based on a qualitative semi-structured interviews with seven social workers within four residential care homes for unaccompanied children. Six themes were identified that seemed to play a role in the discussions about integration: development-acceptance, learning process, communication & relationships, process, personality and common sense. The analysis was based on previous research in the field and the theory of action by Pierre Bourdieu called practical reason. As a conclusion the first three themes can be seen as an understanding of the concept of “integration”. The last three themes exemplify the practical integration work. Despite the lack of regulatory documents, the social workers show a common understanding of the concept and a similar implementation which can be explained by a dominant implicit doxa within the field.

The purpose of this study was to examine Residential Care Aides’ (RCAs) experiences of good quality dementia care provision. Informed by a political economy perspective, I sought to understand how RCAs conceptualize quality dementia care, whether such conceptualizations are reflected in their daily care practice and how the organizational care context impedes or facilitates such care provision. Drawing on a focused ethnographic approach, I utilized in-depth interviews, participant observation and the review of selected documents to contextualize RCAs’ experiences within the organizational care environment. Over a 12-month period, in-depth interviews with 29 staff (21 RCAs, 3 LPNs and 5 managers) and 239 hours of participant observation were conducted in four small-scale dementia units in two nursing homes in British Columbia, Canada. In-depth interviews yielded information-rich data about RCAs’ care experiences and their relationships with residents, while participant observation afforded the opportunity to strategically link RCAs’ actions and interactions with what was said, a feature missing from much of the previous research examining staff perceptions of quality dementia care. A select review of facility documents and provincial licensing regulations provided additional insight regarding the relevance of the larger structural context for RCAs’ care experiences. In general, RCAs conceptualized, and exhibited in their daily physical care provision, quality dementia care as that which focused on tangible care outcomes (i.e., keeping residents clean, comfortable, calm and happy), on their care approach (i.e., delivering care in a compassionate, patient and affectionate manner) and was guided by family ideology (i.e., invoking of family metaphors). Inherent in their care provision was a sense of role tension, as they sought to incorporate social interaction with task completion and their co-workers’ conflicting expectations. Study findings also illustrated how, in the face of continued disempowerment and organizational constraints, RCAs sought to provide quality dementia care by negotiating their peer and supervisory relationships and selectively breaking formal and informal policies/procedures. Salient to RCAs’ experiences of personhood was the limited recognition and appreciation they received from management and the manner in which work-life balance, staffing coverage, human resource management practices and limited information sharing further devalued them and their work. Study findings draw attention to the importance of: acknowledging the role of structural constraints in the pervasiveness of a task-oriented work culture; attending to (and facilitating) staff personhood; facilitating supportive peer and supervisory relationships and; fostering effective management practices as a means of potentially improving care quality. As such, the study sheds important light on what RCAs require within their work environments to help facilitate resident well-being, reinforcing the assertion that residents’ care conditions are inextricably linked to RCAs’ care work conditions. / Graduate / 0351

The purpose of this qualitative study is to look into how social secretaries describe their work with children's participation in the assessment that is carried out at short-term residential facilities for families. Through their descriptions we can gain knowledge of what significance these social workers give children's participation in this context and create more nuances in the overall view on children's participation in Swedish child services. Built in this purpose, we have been interested in how the institutional circumstances can affect children's participation. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with seven social secretaries working in three different facilities for families in two Swedish municipalities. Based on our theoretical assumptions, which are Shier’s pathway to participation (2001) and the interpretation that Svensson, Johnsson and Laanemets (2008) made of Michael Lipsky's (1980/2010) concept of discretion, the interviews have been interpreted and analysed. We have anchored the essay's analysis framework in a social-constructivist approach.  Our results show that the social secretaries places great emphasis on children's participation throughout the assessment process. The work is carried out in an incorporated way where the approach is characterized by seeing the child as an active part and a main person who has the right to participation in ways that works for that specific child. The descriptions show the individual secretaries' ability for child-friendly adaptation in working methods, as well as a shared responsibility for competence development. Experience are referred to as important, as well as reflection on the personal factors that can limit the work. In the result, we can see that a problematic theme lies in the interaction between the social secretary, the parents and the children. The family is in a difficult situation, often enlarged by the intervention in the family's life that moving to the facility entails. How well the collaboration works depends on the possibility to communicate and create relationships built on trust, which directly affects the degree of the child's participation. The result also contains recurring descriptions of how the social secretary decides when the child should be protected from burdensome details, mainly concerning the parents, which can also be regarded as a limiting factor.  Conclusions we have drawn are that children's participation has a central position in these organisations, seen as an indisputable right for all children regardless of age and ability. The discretion of the social secretaries is not limited by organizational factors such as heavy workload or lack of time. It is mainly collaboration difficulties with the family that affect children's participation. However, frequent contact with the family during the long assessment period at the facility create good basis for cooperation, as well as the high degree of transparency and openness that permeates the assessment work according to the social secretaries. Success in relationship-building becomes crucial to children's participation, especially as the path to the child often goes through the parent.

No description available.

Against a burgeoning worldwide discourse on the psychological and emotional impact of HIV&AIDS on children’s development, I conducted an empirical inquiry to explore how a group of nine orphaned and vulnerable children who were residing in a children’s home negotiated pathways to well-being while they were affected by HIV&AIDS. The study aimed to explore, understand and describe the phenomenon of well-being within the specific context of the child participants’ perspectives of their life-worlds. The study was informed by a qualitative and instrumental case study design within an interpretivist paradigm. In addition, it was guided by a conceptual framework derived from key concepts within the fields of HIV&AIDS, positive psychology, coping and resilience theories. The study employed both inductive and deductive methods for knowledge development. I utilised task-based participatory activities to guide the informal and conversational interviews with the children in the study as the main data generation strategy. I incorporated the use of informal observations and an examination of documentation as additional data generation methods. By means of a thematic analysis approach incorporating principles of the constructivist grounded theory analysis of the children’s expressions, I gained insights that informed my understanding of the children’s perceptions and experiences of well-being, risks, challenges and stressors. Findings indicate that the children in the study experienced risks, challenges and stressors arising from personal illness, stigma, discrimination, orphanhood, residential care, death and bereavement. The study has further revealed that those children who portrayed characteristics of well-being and resilient adaptation utilised psychosocial coping mechanisms. In addition, they were supported and strengthened by their positive intrapersonal characteristics and affirmative relationships that offered emotional and psychosocial support within their environments. The findings of the study suggest that feelings of well-being, hope and optimism might have co-existed with feelings of despair and hopelessness in the daily lives of the children in the study who were affected by HIV&AIDS. I concluded this study by suggesting that the well-being experiences of the children in this study may exist on a continuum and may depend on specific events, occasions or incidents on a day-to-day basis. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Educational Psychology / unrestricted

Med utgångspunkt i tidningsartiklar är syftet med denna studie att finna framträdande diskurser kring ungdomar som är placerade inom Statens institutionsstyrelse särskilda ungdomshem, SiS. Tidningsartiklarna som användes i studien är hämtade från dagstidningarna Dagens Nyheter och Svenska Dagbladet samt kvällstidningarna Aftonbladet och Expressen. Med hjälp av den foucauldianska diskursanalysen har 38 tidningsartiklar från åren 2015 till 2019 analyserats. I analysen har makt, subjektpositioner, det underförstådda och utestängningsprocedurer varit i fokus och två framträdande diskurser har identifierats. Den ena är ”Offer för samhällsvård” som framställer SiS ungdomar som offer och att vården är otillräcklig. Den andra är ”SiS ungdomar som farliga förövare” som framställer att SiS ungdomar är farliga förövare både inom institutionsvården och i samhället. Hur vi talar om och vilka diskurser som får företräde i samhället är viktig kunskap för alla verksamma som arbetar inom socialt arbete, både för att öka den kritiska medvetenheten men också utöka kunskapen om den makt språket besitter. / Based on nationwide newspapers, the aim of this study is to find predominant discourses about young people who are placed within the State Institutional Board's special youth homes. The newspaper articles used in the study are taken from the newspapers Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet as well as the evening newspapers Aftonbladet and Expressen. By using a Foucauldian discourse analysis, 38 newspaper articles from the years 2015 to 2019 were analyzed. In the analysis, power, subject positions, the implicit and rules of exclusion have been explored and discovered. Two prominent discourses have been identified. The first one is “Victims of community care” which states that SiS care is insufficient. The second is “SiS youths as dangerous perpetrators”, which states that SiS youths are dangerous perpetrators both in institutional care and in society. To have knowledge about how we talk about a phenomenon, and which discourses that take precedence in society, are important for professionals in social work, since this can raise critical awareness and increase the understandings of the power of language.

In recent years, there has been an establishment of private actors as providers of social work,and since then, the branch of private actors has expanded significantly. This has led tocountless discussions and questions about what it means for social work. The media andsocial scientists question how appropriate it is for private providers to operate social work.One problem that is addressed in research is the concern of private actors focusing onincreasing demand. The second main problem is the concern that Social Services becomes thecustomer instead of the child who is actually in need of help from a Residential care unit(RCU). This essay examines how managers at private RCU:s experiences the benefits anddisadvantages of running a RCU in the private sector, by interviewing seven managers. It alsocompares the interviewees' answers to theories of professionalism in order to examine howworking in the private sector affects professional values of social workers. The results showthat there are both benefits and disadvantages to running a privately owned RCU. The mostsubstantial benefit is that it is easier for managers to make decisions because of the closework with the owners of the RCU. This makes it easier for managers to make large changesand implement new working methods, which also means that private organizations can bemore flexible. Furthermore, the personnel working with the children also have greater impactover the organization. The largest disadvantage that is experienced is the difficulty of runningan organization with requirements of earning a profit. This also has an impact on theprofession of being a social worker. To work in a business that requires a profit can bechallenging as that goes against professional values. The interviewees, however, mean that itis easier to follow professional values, such as care for others, while working in the privatesector due to the personnels’ greater impact over the organization and how to manage their own work.

The aging Canadian population is becoming increasingly ethno-culturally diverse primarily due to immigration. This, together with research indicating increased likelihood of long-term residential care (LTRC) use at older ages and challenges in providing these services, prompt important questions about whether LTRC services are prepared to provide culturally responsive and competent care to immigrant and ethno-cultural minority older adults (EMOA). This ethnographic study, informed by a critical theoretical perspective, explored these questions from the perspectives of South Asian older adults (SAOAs) and their family caregivers (FCGs). In-depth interviews with 18 SAOAs in LTRC, assisted living and those at home, their FCGs, and seven key informants from LTRC and the South Asian (SA) community (n=43) were undertaken. These interviews, in addition to 220 hours of participant observation in two LTRC facilities, provided information regarding the needs, preferences, experiences and situation of SAOAs in LTRC as well as how SA families make decisions regarding the use of such services. A select review of provincial policy, residential care regulation, health authority and facility documents, exposed taken-for-granted assumptions in how care and services are provided and the sociopolitical context of LTRC provision. Study findings suggest that LTRC services are challenged to meet the needs of immigrant and EMOA and reflect unequal and inequitable care, illuminated by the differential impact of macro-policies and resource-constrained LTRC environments on SAOAs and their families and on the ability of existing LTRC services to provide person-centred care. This inequity in service provision has implications for immigrant and EMOA and their family members in light of findings that the decision to move to LTRC is essentially a (non) decision influenced by a range of social structural factors that interact to necessitate the move to LTRC. Study findings revealed the salience of socio-economic status and economic resources in particular, in the (non) decision for LTRC placement. The findings from this study along with demographic shifts in the aging Canadian population call for LTRC service providers and policy makers to actively prepare for increasing ethno-culturally diverse resident populations and point to the need for equity informed approaches to the care of older adults. / Graduate / 2022-03-31