Russian Child Welfare Service Professionals' Attitudes towards Evidence-based Practice and Their Ideas of the Social Practice – Science Relations

Abstract

The article presents the results of the qualitative study of Russian child welfare service professionals’ attitudes towards evidence-based practice. Based on a reflexive thematic analysis of interviews with the professionals from 12 social service organizations several themes have been developed and discussed: 1) evidence-based practice as an important current trend, the connection to which gives several advantages (greater attraction for donor organizations and clients, peer recognition); 2) evidence-based practice as an opportunity to master a new culture of justification and communication; 3) evidence-based practice as a search and organization of new forms of interaction with the scientific community. Russian social service professionals tend to accept the instrumental understanding of the evidence-based practice that is transmitted to them by foundations, donor organizations and the expert community, however, their image of practice as a complex activity that requires taking into account many factors and referring to various sources of knowledge can potentially become the basis for more advanced multifaceted and critical understanding of the evidence-based practice – provided the support of such an understanding, including from the scientific community.