Practicing What We Preach: Creating Groups for Ourselves

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the professional isolation faced by social group work practitioners and educators. It identifies the need for peer support and connection in an environment of limited opportunities for professional development. The paper describes and assesses long-term peer support groups initiated and developed by each of the authors, one for group work educators and the other for practitioners. It discusses the potential for expanding the development of such groups, which could benefit individual group workers as well as strengthen efforts to ensure the survival of group work.     

Political Violence and Adolescent Out‐group Attitudes and Prosocial Behaviors: Implications for Positive Inter‐group Relations

The negative impact of political violence on adolescent adjustment is well established. Less is known about factors that affect adolescents' positive outcomes in ethnically divided societies, especially influences on prosocial behaviors toward the out‐group, which may promote constructive relations. For example, understanding how inter‐group experiences and attitudes motivate out‐group helping may foster inter‐group co‐operation and help to consolidate peace. The current study investigated adolescents' overall and out‐group prosocial behaviors across two time points in Belfast, Northern Ireland (N = 714 dyads; 49% male; Time 1: M = 14.7, SD = 2.0, years old). Controlling for Time 1 prosocial behaviors, age, and gender, multi‐variate structural equation modeling showed that experience with inter‐group sectarian threat predicted fewer out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 2 at the trend level. On the other hand, greater experience of intra‐group non‐sectarian threat at Time 1 predicted more overall and out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 2. Moreover, positive out‐group attitudes strengthened the link between intra‐group threat and out‐group prosocial behaviors one year later. Finally, experience with intra‐group non‐sectarian threat and out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 1 was related to more positive out‐group attitudes at Time 2. The implications for youth development and inter‐group relations in post‐accord societies are discussed.     

Crossing Boundaries: Comparing Group Work in the United States and Australia

ABSTRACT

This article compares the teaching and practice of group work in Australia and the U.S., including data on both students and practitioners, group work content in selected schools of social work, the types of groups offered and client populations served. Implications for cross-cultural social work are discussed as are areas of future international collaboration and research.     

Friendship Across the Life Cycle

Abstract

Using a group work model, this article discusses a short term group for older women developed to explore the importance of friendship in late life. In collaboration with group leaders, group members determined weekly topics that explored the significance of friendship through the life cycle. Social work group practice that focuses on the meaning and development of friendship for and with older women is presented as an effective therapeutic intervention for practitioners in settings such as community mental health clinics, senior centers, elderly housing, home care agencies and nursing homes.     

Transcending Differences: Using Concrete Subject-Matter in Heterogeneous Groups

ABSTRACT

The need to conduct social group work with heterogeneous members is a reality. Yet the social work literature does not offer much guidance in how to work with diverse groups of people. This paper illustrates a method of social group work that utilizes tangible and palpable subject matter as a therapeutic vehicle to create strong group cohesion with heterogeneous group members. It aims to explain how and why using non-personal subjects as the heart of the group helps people connect to themselves, to the world and to each other in a personal way. The examples given are from two groups that are very different in their compositions and very different from each other. One is a psycho-educational group at a Continuing Day Treatment Program for severely and persistently mentally ill elderly and the other is a group with adolescent and pre-adolescent females in a community center. Four benefits of using this method of social group work are outlined.     

Purpose: A Misunderstood and Misused Keystone of Group Work Practice

SUMMARY

This paper examines the use of Purpose in social group work practice. It identifies and discusses six common mistakes that practitioners often make in regard to this central concept. A group example is used to illustrate the paper's content. The paper's intent is to enhance workers' understanding of and ability to use Purpose skillfully in their work with groups.     

Spirituality in Social Work Groups: Practitioners Speak Out

ABSTRACT

The attitudes of experienced clinicians regarding the inclusion of spirituality in social group work practice and education are examined. Using a focus group format, practitioners concurred that wholistic treatment of clients must embody spiritual issues and that spiritual content should be covered in group work courses. Clinicians identified additional issues including: (a) need for spiritual assessment; (b) necessity of practitioner self-awareness; (c) usefulness of spiritual beliefs and communities as resources; (d) creation of a safe environment; (e) promotion of spiritual diversity in groups; and (f) collaboration with clergy and spiritual leaders. Implications for practice, research, and education are discussed.     

Adventure Therapy: Nondeliberative Group Work in Action

ABSTRACT

Nondeliberative group work allows group members to generate their own solutions and provides experiential opportunities to transfer learning to life outside of a therapeutic setting. Adventure therapy is explored as a tool for engaging groups in a nondeliberative manner. The theoretical underpinnings of adventure therapy are presented and contextualized within the larger framework of experiential education. Specific methods and models of adventure work are presented and considered in relationship to nondeliberative social work with groups. Two case examples are presented to illustrate the nondeliberative nature of adventure therapy.     

Social Group Work for Young Offenders with Learning Disabilities

ABSTRACT

Despite the high incidence of learning disabilities among young offenders, research suggests that young offenders with learning disabilities do not receive interventions that address their learning disabilities. Group treatment approaches for young offenders typically utilize a cognitive-behavioral orientation. Cognitive behavioral techniques have been found to be effective with the young offender population by targeting their faulty thinking. However, cognitive behavioral treatment is less effective with youth who have academic delays. Individuals with learning disabilities may have difficulties with the cognitive tasks used in cognitive behavioral treatment. This paper describes a treatment group, with illustrations, adapted for young offenders with learning disabilities, combining cognitive-behavioral and mutual-aid principles.     

A Model for Group Work Practice with Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Victims of Domestic Violence: A Qualitative Study

ABSTRACT

The Orthodox Jewish community has only recently acknowledged that religious practice and commitment does not make one immune to suffering from domestic violence. Effective therapeutic techniques for working with battered Orthodox women have only recently begun to emerge.

This article focuses on the use of group work as an effective therapeutic modality for working with abused Orthodox Jewish women. This research highlights the insight, knowledge, and experience of practitioners who facilitate domestic violence groups, focusing on proficiencies and ethnic-sensitive practice strategies that are perceived to lead to successful outcomes.

The application of ethnic-sensitive strategies is discussed to illustrate viable therapeutic considerations for working with this population. Implications and issues for educators and practitioners will be addressed.     

You Don't Always Have to Pick Up Your Mess Right Away: How Being Messy Can Be Really Neat!

SUMMARY

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate a first year student's field placement experience at a group home for mentally ill adolescent boys. Upon discovering she has to “un-learn” past “learned” group work skills, she eagerly anticipates future opportunities to utilize “re-learned” theory acquired from major method course readings and lectures. Once in the field, she confronts the difficulties that this presents. The following is an account of the fears and frustrations as well as the joys and rewards one student encountered while attempting to apply and practice group work methodology in the field.     

Retrospective Book Review: Teaching a Methods Course in Social Work with Groups

SUMMARY

Eight years after its publication, Teaching a Methods Course in Social Work with Groups serves as a reminder to social workers of group work's historic roots and its value as a method of practice with diverse populations. The author shares her experiences in utilizing the teaching text in her work with MSW students and students of the arts who facilitate activity-based groups in community settings. Citing examples of students' experiences in group work facilitation, the author touches on the constraints emerging group workers face in translating social work skills and values to practice. The author's retrospective review of the teaching text underscores its continued importance in the field of social group work instruction.     

A Model for Implementing an Evidence-Based Practice in Student Fieldwork Placements: Barriers and Facilitators to the Use of “SBIRT”

ABSTRACT

This article reports on focus group data analysis that was used to understand initial, largely positive outcomes from a university-based initiative to disseminate and implement an evidence-based practice (EBP)—Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment for Substance Use (SBIRT)—into student fieldwork placements, which are usual care social work settings. Focus groups were conducted with three groups of stakeholders involved in the ongoing project: social work department faculty (n = 10), bachelor- and master-level social work students (n = 8), and social work fieldwork instructors (n = 6). Dimensional analysis of the focus group data yielded results indicating that dissemination and implementation of SBIRT was influenced by agency- and school-level factors and perceived fit between the EBP and individual professional identity, intrapersonal characteristics, and timing. The resulting model, developed through the focus group analysis, is offered and shows how these factors interacted and affected training, supervision, and use of the EBP. The model provides social work educational programs and agencies a working tool for diagnosing and proactively addressing barriers and breakdowns in the EBP implementation process. Future research that tests the model as a diagnostic tool and generates knowledge about its influence in developing competent evidence-based practitioners is indicated. Future focus groups in relation to this initiative are needed to better understand these barriers and facilitators in the EBP implementation process and their critical roles in the process of translating SBIRT into standard social work practice.     

The Impact of Time and Place on Mutual-Aid Practice with Short-Term Groups

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to help practitioners promote mutual aid to short-term groups. It describes and discusses the impact of time and place on the process of such groups. The challenges of the short-term group are identified and implications for practice are drawn.     

Matching Practice Skills with Client Problems

Abstract

Despite the increasing pressure to measure social work practice skills and relate those activities to client outcomes and treatment costs, relatively little social work research has been devoted to the development of social work process instruments. The recent development of the Practice Skills Inventory has provided practitioners with a useful tool for measuring the frequency with which practitioners employ specific categories of common social work intervention skills. However, it is important to demonstrate that social workers employ these practice skills differentially depending on clients' presenting problems. The current study of 281 experienced MSW practitioners demonstrates that they, indeed, emphasize supportive, therapeutic, case management and insight facilitation skills differentially depending on the problems experienced by their clients. Implications for practice and evaluation research are addressed.     

Maternal disclosure and adolescent prosocial behavior: The mediating roles of adolescent disclosure and coping

In this study, we considered the impact of mothers' willingness to disclose about distressing events and rule transgressions on their adolescent children's willingness to disclose about similar events, as well as adolescents' ability to cope and to show concern for others. Mothers and their 12‐ to 14‐year‐old children (N = 125) were asked to say how likely they would be to talk about moderately distressing concerns as well as minor rule transgressions. Adolescent positive coping skills were also assessed. Teachers (N = 92) rated the adolescents' prosocial behaviors in the classroom. Adolescents' disclosure about distressing events and positive coping mediated the relation between maternal disclosure about distressing events and adolescent prosocial behavior. Further, maternal disclosure alone about both distressing events and rule transgressions was related to adolescent prosocial behavior through positive coping. These results suggest that mothers' willingness to talk about their own negative experiences can help children cope better and, ultimately, to show greater empathy and concern for others.     

Group Work Gets Physical: Self-Defense Class and Social Work

SUMMARY

This article examines how a self-defense class is a social work group when it incorporates basic group work principles. The ways in which stages of group development, member roles and mutual aid are used in a self-defense class will be explored. The article also highlights how a self-defense class can be a legitimate intervention for women who have been victimized.     

Putting Ideas to Paper: A Guideline for Practitioners (and Others) Who Wish to Write for Publication

SUMMARY

This article offers guidelines for aspiring writers who wish to have their work published. Especially geared for practitioners, it includes suggestions for getting started, staying focused, structuring an article, understanding the writing process, overcoming frustration, coping with reviewers' critiques and enduring through to completion.