Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Parker, Heather A

Titel

A Qualitative Study Analyzing CPS Social Workers: Creating Meaning through Communication and Hidden Internal Biases

Ort / Verlag

ProQuest Dissertations Publishing

Erscheinungsjahr

2014

Link zum Volltext

• ProQuest

Quelle

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The goal of this study is to determine how social workers create meaning through communication with their clients and if internalized oppression influences their communication behaviors. The literature review and research reveal a number of subareas that need to be addressed in order to understand why dialogue takes a primary role in the positive outcome of a Child Protective Service (CPS) case. A review of educational material and scholarly literature was combined with an ethnographic study which included individual interviews and focus groups. It explored the societal dilemma of racism and internalized biases; along with the dynamics of communication between social workers and their clients. The thesis applied Pearce and Cronen's Coordinated Management of Meaning theory and Buber's Dialogic Ethics theory to better understand how they can assist social workers in their work with their clients. There is little scholarly information on how social worker and client dialogue can create meaning or how internal biases may affect a client's case and its outcome. Though, there is sufficient research on disparities and disproportionalities concerning CPS and about minority cases and children in the CPS system. The literature and results provided in this study show that there is racism within the infrastructure of CPS, however there are social workers that are able to identify, recognize and acknowledge their flaws, they also respect, and accept intercultural differences. Whether the social workers can then separate their biases and be able to perform proper case management may depend on the case or social worker.