(The Graduate) School (of Social Work) and Society

A learning paradigm for teaching social work research is offered as an alternative to the consumership models, the researcher as technician models, and the integration of research into other curriculum areas. The model presented adheres closely to the principle of knowledge-guided practice and ties knowledge about knowledge to the practice demands of the profession. The result is a highly integrative experience for the student. The last course has become a model for an integrative seminar.     

The Value Base of Social Work

Values may be conceived along three basic dimensions which would account for the major value orientations shared by social workers and related to all aspects of their professional practice. These are: preferred conceptions of people, preferred outcomes for people, and preferred instrumentalities for dealing with people. Distinguished from “knowledge,” and adequately refined, these categories of values might constitute a guide for planning and action in social work practice and education. The predictability of professional behavior which might then result would also define the expectations of clients and society with respect to what the social work profession stands for and what it does.     

Attitudes of nursing students toward death and dying: A research note

Fear, denial, and the avoidance of death and dying appear to be products of life in modern society. While society insulates most people from contact with the death and dying of others, there are professions that come into repeated contact with dying individuals. The present study uses the Collett‐Lester Fear of Death Scale to analyze the Fear of Death and Dying for Self and Others (four subscales) among a sample of registered nurses (BA level). Over a 10‐year period, nurses’ fears concerning death and dying were measured at three points—before a course on death and dying (Pretest), after the course (Posttest), and at a point in their professional nursing practice (Retest). The results suggest that these nurses’ fears of death for self and others change at a statistically significant level over the Pretest and Posttest observations; however, the changes are temporary. The Fear of Dying for Self and Others tends to decline significantly over the Pretest and Retest observations. Age, religion, religiosity, and employment factors were also analyzed vis‐à‐vis the Fear of Death and Dying Subscales. Some directions for additional research into nurses’ fears about death and dying are given.     

Diagnostics for multivariate imputations

Summary.  We consider three sorts of diagnostics for random imputations: displays of the completed data, which are intended to reveal unusual patterns that might suggest problems with the imputations, comparisons of the distributions of observed and imputed data values and checks of the fit of observed data to the model that is used to create the imputations. We formulate these methods in terms of sequential regression multivariate imputation, which is an iterative procedure in which the missing values of each variable are randomly imputed conditionally on all the other variables in the completed data matrix. We also consider a recalibration procedure for sequential regression imputations. We apply these methods to the 2002 environmental sustainability index, which is a linear aggregation of 64 environmental variables on 142 countries.     

On the definition and varieties of attitude and wellbeing

In a paper published in Social Indicators Research in 1975, Levy and Guttman proved the proposition that wellbeing is a special case of attitude. They exploited this result for establishing a certain lawfulness for wellbeing behavior, and built on this for revealing more specialized features of the lawfulness. Five years later in this same journal, Andrews and McKennell published two papers on exactly the same proposition, but without proving it, without building on known relevant lawfulness of attitudinal behavior, and without mentioning (neither positively nor negatively) the Levy-Guttman work. The Andrews-McKennell papers are shown to be a retrogression rather than a scientific advance, being conceptually confused, using inappropriate data analysis, and dealing with arbitrary assumptions which are either untested, untestable or false.     

NASW’s Supervisory Leaders in Aging: An Acceptable and Feasible Model for Training and Supporting Social Work Supervisors

Social services are instrumental in addressing challenges associated with aging. Yet, practitioners report needing expanded gerontological knowledge and better supervision. The Supervisory Leaders in Aging (SLA) program of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) was designed to improve gerontological services by strengthening supervision of the social service workforce. With support from the John A. Hartford Foundation, the program was adopted between 2015 and 2017 in four regions, where NASW trained 134 MSW supervisors who support 1200 social service staff, potentially enhancing the well-being of 264,000 clients annually. The SLA curriculum and in-person educational approach constitute a model for supervisor professional development. Quality improvement evaluations suggested feasibility of program adoption and acceptability. Participants rated each of 10 workshops and 97% agreed that instructors were effective, that knowledge was expanded, and that content was relevant, appropriate, and likely to be used. Implications of this model for enhancing supervisory practice are discussed.     

Practice-Specific Risk Perceptions and Self-Reported Food Safety Practices

The relationship between risk perception and risk avoidance is typically analyzed using self-reported measures. However, in domains such as driving or food handling, the validity of responses about usual behavior is threatened because people think about the situations in which they are self-aware, such as when they encounter a hazard. Indeed, researchers have often noted a divergence between what people say about their behavior and how they actually behave. Thus, in order to draw conclusions about risk perceptions and risk avoidance from survey data, it is important to identify particular cognitive elements, such as those measured by questions about risk and safety knowledge, risk perceptions, or information search behavior, which may be effective antecedents of self-reported safety behavior. It is also important to identify and correct for potential sources of bias that may exist in the data. The authors analyze the Food and Drug Administration's 1998 Food Safety Survey to determine whether there are consistent cognitive antecedents for three types of safe food practices: preparation, eating, and cooling of foods. An assessment of measurement biases shows that endogeneity of food choices affects reports of food preparation. In addition, response bias affects reports of cooling practices as evidenced by its relation to knowledge and information search, a pattern of cognitive effects unique to cooling practices. After correcting for these biases, results show that practice-specific risk perceptions are the primary cognitive antecedents of safe food behavior, which has implications for the design of effective education messages about food safety.