Social workPub Date : 2026-05-09DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag025
Hyojin Cho
{"title":"Tracing Job Quality and Equity in the Social Work Profession.","authors":"Hyojin Cho","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag025","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag025","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Poor job quality, particularly low wages, remains a persistent concern in the social work profession, contributing to high turnover and recruitment challenges. Although concerns over the quality of social work jobs may not be new, we know little about how the quality of social work jobs has evolved over time and for whom. Using four decades of Current Population Survey data, this article examines trends and variations by gender and race on multiple dimensions of job quality for social workers. The analyses reveal that although some dimensions, such as wages and full-time employment, have improved, other aspects of job quality have worsened, including increased risk of low pay and reduced access to employer-provided benefits. Limited progress has been made in reducing gender gaps in job quality, and racial disparities have worsened over time, with Black social workers facing a higher risk of low job quality than White social workers. The implications for the future of the social work profession are discussed, emphasizing the need to improve quality and equity in social work jobs.</p>","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147864498","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-05-07DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag031
Lisa de Saxe Zerden
{"title":"Hard Seasons: Reflections on Growth and Change in Social Work.","authors":"Lisa de Saxe Zerden","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag031","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag031","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-05-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147842764","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-05-02DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag023
Stephanie Jane Louise Rost
{"title":"Human Mesh Networks: Communicating Social Work Research during Collapse Conditions.","authors":"Stephanie Jane Louise Rost","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag023","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147820634","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-15DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag020
Eva Nowakowski-Sims
{"title":"Practical Considerations for Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy among Social Workers.","authors":"Eva Nowakowski-Sims","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag020","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147692205","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-15DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag022
Julie A Steen, Chris Stewart
{"title":"Case Assignment Principles for Achieving Worker Well-Being, Organizational Justice, and Casework Quality.","authors":"Julie A Steen, Chris Stewart","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag022","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag022","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This qualitative descriptive study was designed to identify case assignment principles and capture the ways supervisors and case managers experience these principles. A total of 59 supervisors and 127 case managers from the child welfare field responded to two open-ended survey questions about the case assignment principles used in their agencies. The first aim was to provide a description of case assignment principles. Coding of responses revealed eight principles that guided case assignment. These eight principles include rotation, equalization of caseload, equalization of the number of families/children served, equalization of caseload complexity, matching to case manager competence, matching to case manager interest/convenience, respecting case manager safety, and supervisor discretion. The second aim was to provide a description of experiences with these varied case assignment principles. Authors identified three themes of fairness/organizational justice, worker well-being, and casework quality. The results outline the varied ways in which case assignment is conducted and point to the difficulties in simultaneously achieving the three goals of fairness, worker well-being, and casework quality through a single case assignment method.</p>","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147692170","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-13DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag018
Derrick Alan Kranke, Bridget Kranke
{"title":"Incorporating a Strengths-Based Approach to the Treatment of Fibromyalgia.","authors":"Derrick Alan Kranke, Bridget Kranke","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag018","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swag018","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147676452","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-01DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag008
Matthew Tvedte, Allison Henry, Amanda Meers, Lisa Volpigno, Pamela Chamorro, Matthew Taylor, Brianna O'Connell, Abigail M Ross
{"title":"Harnessing the Power of Simulation: Advancing Social Work Practice through Hospital Committees.","authors":"Matthew Tvedte, Allison Henry, Amanda Meers, Lisa Volpigno, Pamela Chamorro, Matthew Taylor, Brianna O'Connell, Abigail M Ross","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag008","DOIUrl":"10.1093/sw/swag008","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Committees are a core component of organizational infrastructure and clinical governance in health and hospital systems and a viable mechanism through which to accomplish goals, facilitate departmental initiatives, produce deliverables, and improve departmental functioning. In this article, authors describe the development, evolution, and activities of a hospital social work department simulation (SW SIM) committee, which culminated in the production and deployment of a simulation-based learning (SBL) course designed specifically for social workers employed in a large, urban, quaternary pediatric hospital. With its focus on suicide risk assessment and treatment competencies, a priority identified through departmental surveys in conjunction with social work (SW) leadership, this course was the first to be developed at the institution specifically for social workers that targeted psychosocial (as opposed to medical or interprofessional) competencies. Using development and production of the SBL suicide risk assessment and management course as a case example, this article illustrates the SW SIM committee's collaboration processes with the SW department, SW leadership, key content experts, and the institution's simulation program. The article concludes with a discussion of lessons learned and factors to consider when engaging in committee-led departmental initiatives such as SBL course development.</p>","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":"176-184"},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147310519","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-01DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag006
Aleksa Owen, Carli Friedman
{"title":"Hidden Bias: Social Service Professionals' Attitudes toward Physical Disability.","authors":"Aleksa Owen, Carli Friedman","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag006","DOIUrl":"10.1093/sw/swag006","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Implicit social cognition, also known as implicit bias, may impact social work practice. Because social workers commonly work with people with disabilities, it is important to understand more about social service professionals' attitudes about physical disability. By using descriptive and inferential statistical tests to quantitatively analyze secondary 2023 data from social service professionals, including social workers and counselors (n = 5,167), this study found that 70.3 percent of respondents reported having no explicit preference for people with or without physical disabilities, 23.7 percent reported preferring people without physical disabilities explicitly, and 6.0 percent reported preferring people with physical disabilities explicitly. For implicit attitudes, most participants had implicit preference for people without physical disabilities (77.8 percent), 13.7 percent had no implicit preference for people with or without physical disabilities, and 8.5 percent implicitly preferred people with physical disabilities. There was a statistically significant relationship between explicit and implicit attitudes, with most people having discordant explicit and implicit attitudes, often with low levels of explicit bias and high levels of implicit bias. This study also found age, gender, disability, having friends/family with disabilities, education, and political orientation correlated with explicit and implicit disability attitudes. The article ends with a discussion of educational interventions to reduce disability-related implicit bias.</p>","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":"129-138"},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147321966","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social workPub Date : 2026-04-01DOI: 10.1093/sw/swag005
Jinhui Lai, Yuan Wang, Caiyun Qi
{"title":"Emotion as a Skill: A Practical Methodology for Coping with Emotional Risks in Social Work.","authors":"Jinhui Lai, Yuan Wang, Caiyun Qi","doi":"10.1093/sw/swag005","DOIUrl":"10.1093/sw/swag005","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Emotional risks are ubiquitous in social work practice and pose significant threats to the health and well-being of practitioners and clients. Emotional skills are recognized as the best practice approach for coping with these risks. However, existing research on emotional skills is almost all from the fields of medicine, education, and psychology, and little attention is paid to it in the social work literature. To address this gap, the study explored Chinese social workers' experiences and perceptions of using emotional skills in practice through semistructured interviews (N = 28). The study suggests that emotion can be used as a practical skill for social workers, who have developed two patterns of practice for emotional skills: \"self-directed\" emotion management and \"other-directed\" emotion management. In the practice of coping with emotional risk in oneself and others, social workers navigated three stages of identification, understanding, and management and employed relevant professional skills (such as body scanning, empathy, and communicating emotions to others). The study results are pragmatic, and the action plan model of emotional skills has significant implications for social work practice and education.</p>","PeriodicalId":21875,"journal":{"name":"Social work","volume":" ","pages":"139-147"},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146143403","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}