Research Publications

Education and research on social work’s role in preventing client suicide is limited. Seventy advanced master of social work students were randomly assigned to either the training group (Question, Persuade, and Referral suicide gatekeeper training) or the control group. Outcomes measured over time included suicide knowledge, attitudes toward suicide prevention, self-efficacy, and skills.

Building evidence of effective practice in child welfare requires practitioners and researchers to know the extent to which programs are implemented in order to understand evaluation results. Fidelity monitoring is a critical strategy for ensuring that evidence-based and promising practices are implemented as intended and can be studied in real-world contexts. This paper addresses challenges to measuring fidelity in child welfare systems and presents an approach taken with one state to define fidelity criteria and measure fidelity to a child safety intervention.

A family-centered approach to health care for children with special health care needs (CSHCN) is widely acknowledged as the ideal model of service delivery, but less is known about the actual practice of family-centered care (FCC), especially from the viewpoints of parents and health care professionals. This cross-sectional research compared parent and health care professional perspectives on the degree to which FCC is being provided at a large, urban hospital in the United States. The Measure of Process of Care (MPOC) was administered to a representative sample of 92 parents of CSHCN; a convenience sample of 43 health care professionals completed the service provider version of the MPOC. A mixed-model analysis of variance was conducted to test for group differences on matched domain scores of the MPOC. No significant differences emerged between the two stakeholder groups, but significant …

Attitudes in academics, career, civic responsibility, and empowerment were reported before and after 143 undergraduate Family Studies students completed a servicelearning project. Results suggested improved academic and career post-test scores. Civic responsibility and empowerment improved but not significantly. Open-ended responses suggested three additional outcomes: group work, leadership, and empathy. Implications for academic programs focused on engaging students in service-learning projects working with or on behalf of families are discussed.

Twenty MSW students, chosen on the basis of diverse cultural and personal characteristics, were interviewed about their motivations for pursuing an MSW degree and their personal and professional values. Thematic analysis yielded an emergent model relating the intersection of multiple forms of motivation, encountering and resolving value conflicts, and integrating personal and professional identities.