social work research for dummies

Social Work Research Methods That Drive the Practice

Social workers advocate for the well-being of individuals, families and communities. But how do social workers know what interventions are needed to help an individual? How do they assess whether a treatment plan is working? What do social workers use to write evidence-based policy?

Social work involves research-informed practice and practice-informed research. At every level, social workers need to know objective facts about the populations they serve, the efficacy of their interventions and the likelihood that their policies will improve lives. A variety of social work research methods make that possible.

Data-Driven Work

Data is a collection of facts used for reference and analysis. In a field as broad as social work, data comes in many forms.

Quantitative vs. Qualitative

As with any research, social work research involves both quantitative and qualitative studies.

Quantitative Research

Answers to questions like these can help social workers know about the populations they serve — or hope to serve in the future.

• How many students currently receive reduced-price school lunches in the local school district?
• How many hours per week does a specific individual consume digital media?
• How frequently did community members access a specific medical service last year?

Quantitative data — facts that can be measured and expressed numerically — are crucial for social work.

Quantitative research has advantages for social scientists. Such research can be more generalizable to large populations, as it uses specific sampling methods and lends itself to large datasets. It can provide important descriptive statistics about a specific population. Furthermore, by operationalizing variables, it can help social workers easily compare similar datasets with one another.

Qualitative Research

Qualitative data — facts that cannot be measured or expressed in terms of mere numbers or counts — offer rich insights into individuals, groups and societies. It can be collected via interviews and observations.

• What attitudes do students have toward the reduced-price school lunch program?
• What strategies do individuals use to moderate their weekly digital media consumption?
• What factors made community members more or less likely to access a specific medical service last year?

Qualitative research can thereby provide a textured view of social contexts and systems that may not have been possible with quantitative methods. Plus, it may even suggest new lines of inquiry for social work research.

Mixed Methods Research

Combining quantitative and qualitative methods into a single study is known as mixed methods research. This form of research has gained popularity in the study of social sciences, according to a 2019 report in the academic journal Theory and Society. Since quantitative and qualitative methods answer different questions, merging them into a single study can balance the limitations of each and potentially produce more in-depth findings.

However, mixed methods research is not without its drawbacks. Combining research methods increases the complexity of a study and generally requires a higher level of expertise to collect, analyze and interpret the data. It also requires a greater level of effort, time and often money.

The Importance of Research Design

Data-driven practice plays an essential role in social work. Unlike philanthropists and altruistic volunteers, social workers are obligated to operate from a scientific knowledge base.

To know whether their programs are effective, social workers must conduct research to determine results, aggregate those results into comprehensible data, analyze and interpret their findings, and use evidence to justify next steps.

Employing the proper design ensures that any evidence obtained during research enables social workers to reliably answer their research questions.

Research Methods in Social Work

The various social work research methods have specific benefits and limitations determined by context. Common research methods include surveys, program evaluations, needs assessments, randomized controlled trials, descriptive studies and single-system designs.

Surveys involve a hypothesis and a series of questions in order to test that hypothesis. Social work researchers will send out a survey, receive responses, aggregate the results, analyze the data, and form conclusions based on trends.

Surveys are one of the most common research methods social workers use — and for good reason. They tend to be relatively simple and are usually affordable. However, surveys generally require large participant groups, and self-reports from survey respondents are not always reliable.

Program Evaluations

Social workers ally with all sorts of programs: after-school programs, government initiatives, nonprofit projects and private programs, for example.

Crucially, social workers must evaluate a program’s effectiveness in order to determine whether the program is meeting its goals and what improvements can be made to better serve the program’s target population.

Evidence-based programming helps everyone save money and time, and comparing programs with one another can help social workers make decisions about how to structure new initiatives. Evaluating programs becomes complicated, however, when programs have multiple goal metrics, some of which may be vague or difficult to assess (e.g., “we aim to promote the well-being of our community”).

Needs Assessments

Social workers use needs assessments to identify services and necessities that a population lacks access to.

Common social work populations that researchers may perform needs assessments on include:

• People in a specific income group
• Everyone in a specific geographic region
• A specific ethnic group
• People in a specific age group

In the field, a social worker may use a combination of methods (e.g., surveys and descriptive studies) to learn more about a specific population or program. Social workers look for gaps between the actual context and a population’s or individual’s “wants” or desires.

For example, a social worker could conduct a needs assessment with an individual with cancer trying to navigate the complex medical-industrial system. The social worker may ask the client questions about the number of hours they spend scheduling doctor’s appointments, commuting and managing their many medications. After learning more about the specific client needs, the social worker can identify opportunities for improvements in an updated care plan.

In policy and program development, social workers conduct needs assessments to determine where and how to effect change on a much larger scale. Integral to social work at all levels, needs assessments reveal crucial information about a population’s needs to researchers, policymakers and other stakeholders. Needs assessments may fall short, however, in revealing the root causes of those needs (e.g., structural racism).

Randomized Controlled Trials

Randomized controlled trials are studies in which a randomly selected group is subjected to a variable (e.g., a specific stimulus or treatment) and a control group is not. Social workers then measure and compare the results of the randomized group with the control group in order to glean insights about the effectiveness of a particular intervention or treatment.

Randomized controlled trials are easily reproducible and highly measurable. They’re useful when results are easily quantifiable. However, this method is less helpful when results are not easily quantifiable (i.e., when rich data such as narratives and on-the-ground observations are needed).

Descriptive Studies

Descriptive studies immerse the researcher in another context or culture to study specific participant practices or ways of living. Descriptive studies, including descriptive ethnographic studies, may overlap with and include other research methods:

• Informant interviews
• Census data
• Observation

By using descriptive studies, researchers may glean a richer, deeper understanding of a nuanced culture or group on-site. The main limitations of this research method are that it tends to be time-consuming and expensive.

Single-System Designs

Unlike most medical studies, which involve testing a drug or treatment on two groups — an experimental group that receives the drug/treatment and a control group that does not — single-system designs allow researchers to study just one group (e.g., an individual or family).

Single-system designs typically entail studying a single group over a long period of time and may involve assessing the group’s response to multiple variables.

For example, consider a study on how media consumption affects a person’s mood. One way to test a hypothesis that consuming media correlates with low mood would be to observe two groups: a control group (no media) and an experimental group (two hours of media per day). When employing a single-system design, however, researchers would observe a single participant as they watch two hours of media per day for one week and then four hours per day of media the next week.

These designs allow researchers to test multiple variables over a longer period of time. However, similar to descriptive studies, single-system designs can be fairly time-consuming and costly.

Learn More About Social Work Research Methods

Social workers have the opportunity to improve the social environment by advocating for the vulnerable — including children, older adults and people with disabilities — and facilitating and developing resources and programs.

Learn more about how you can earn your  Master of Social Work online at Virginia Commonwealth University . The highest-ranking school of social work in Virginia, VCU has a wide range of courses online. That means students can earn their degrees with the flexibility of learning at home. Learn more about how you can take your career in social work further with VCU.

From M.S.W. to LCSW: Understanding Your Career Path as a Social Worker

How Palliative Care Social Workers Support Patients With Terminal Illnesses

How to Become a Social Worker in Health Care

Gov.uk, Mixed Methods Study

MVS Open Press, Foundations of Social Work Research

Open Social Work Education, Scientific Inquiry in Social Work

Open Social Work, Graduate Research Methods in Social Work: A Project-Based Approach

Routledge, Research for Social Workers: An Introduction to Methods

SAGE Publications, Research Methods for Social Work: A Problem-Based Approach

Theory and Society, Mixed Methods Research: What It Is and What It Could Be

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The link between social work research and practice

When thinking about social work, some may consider the field to solely focus on clinical interventions with individuals or groups.

There may be a mistaken impression that research is not a part of the social work profession. This is completely false. Rather, the two have been and will continue to need to be intertwined.

This guide covers why social workers should care about research, how both social work practice and social work research influence and guide each other, how to build research skills both as a student and as a professional working in the field, and the benefits of being a social worker with strong research skills. 

A selection of social work research jobs are also discussed.  

• Social workers and research
• Evidence-based practice
• Practice and research
• Research and practice
• Build research skills
• Social worker as researcher
• Benefits of research skills
• Research jobs

Why should social workers care about research?

Sometimes it may seem as though social work practice and social work research are two separate tracks running parallel to each other – they both seek to improve the lives of clients, families and communities, but they don’t interact. This is not the way it is supposed to work.

Research and practice should be intertwined, with each affecting the other and improving processes on both ends, so that it leads to better outcomes for the population we’re serving.

Section 5 of the NASW Social Work Code of Ethics is focused on social workers’ ethical responsibilities to the social work profession. There are two areas in which research is mentioned in upholding our ethical obligations: for the integrity of the profession (section 5.01) and for evaluation and research (section 5.02). 

Some of the specific guidance provided around research and social work include:

• 5.01(b): …Social workers should protect, enhance, and improve the integrity of the profession through appropriate study and research, active discussion, and responsible criticism of the profession.
• 5.01(d): Social workers should contribute to the knowledge base of social work and share with colleagues their knowledge related to practice, research, and ethics…
• 5.02(a) Social workers should monitor and evaluate policies, the implementation of programs, and practice interventions.
• 5.02(b) Social workers should promote and facilitate evaluation and research to contribute to the development of knowledge.
• 5.02(c) Social workers should critically examine and keep current with emerging knowledge relevant to social work and fully use evaluation and research evidence in their professional practice.
• 5.02(q) Social workers should educate themselves, their students, and their colleagues about responsible research practices.

Evidence-based practice and evidence-based treatment

In order to strengthen the profession and determine that the interventions we are providing are, in fact, effective, we must conduct research. When research and practice are intertwined, this leads practitioners to develop evidence-based practice (EBP) and evidence-based treatment (EBT).

Evidence-based practice is, according to The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) , a process involving creating an answerable question based on a client or organizational need, locating the best available evidence to answer the question, evaluating the quality of the evidence as well as its applicability, applying the evidence, and evaluating the effectiveness and efficiency of the solution. 

Evidence-based treatment is any practice that has been established as effective through scientific research according to a set of explicit criteria (Drake et al., 2001). These are interventions that, when applied consistently, routinely produce improved client outcomes. 

For example, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) was one of a variety of interventions for those with anxiety disorders. Researchers wondered if CBT was better than other intervention options in producing positive, consistent results for clients.

So research was conducted comparing multiple types of interventions, and the evidence (research results) demonstrated that CBT was the best intervention.

The anecdotal evidence from practice combined with research evidence determined that CBT should become the standard treatment for those diagnosed with anxiety. Now more social workers are getting trained in CBT methods in order to offer this as a treatment option to their clients.

How does social work practice affect research?

Social work practice provides the context and content for research. For example, agency staff was concerned about the lack of nutritional food in their service area, and heard from clients that it was too hard to get to a grocery store with a variety of foods, because they didn’t have transportation, or public transit took too long. 

So the agency applied for and received a grant to start a farmer’s market in their community, an urban area that was considered a food desert. This program accepted their state’s version of food stamps as a payment option for the items sold at the farmer’s market.

The agency used their passenger van to provide free transportation to and from the farmer’s market for those living more than four blocks from the market location.

The local university also had a booth each week at the market with nursing and medical students checking blood pressure and providing referrals to community agencies that could assist with medical needs. The agency was excited to improve the health of its clients by offering this program.

But how does the granting foundation know if this was a good use of their money? This is where research and evaluation comes in. Research could gather data to answer a number of questions. Here is but a small sample:

• How many community members visited each week and purchased fruits and vegetables? 
• How many took advantage of the transportation provided, and how many walked to the market? 
• How many took advantage of the blood pressure checks? Were improvements seen in those numbers for those having repeat blood pressure readings throughout the market season? 
• How much did the self-reported fruit and vegetable intake increase for customers? 
• What barriers did community members report in visiting and buying food from the market (prices too high? Inconvenient hours?)
• Do community members want the program to continue next year?
• Was the program cost-effective, or did it waste money by paying for a driver and for gasoline to offer free transportation that wasn’t utilized? What are areas where money could be saved without compromising the quality of the program?
• What else needs to be included in this program to help improve the health of community members?

How does research affect social work practice?

Research can guide practice to implement proven strategies. It can also ask the ‘what if’ or ‘how about’ questions that can open doors for new, innovative interventions to be developed (and then research the effectiveness of those interventions).

Engel and Schutt (2017) describe four categories of research used in social work:

• Descriptive research is research in which social phenomena are defined and described. A descriptive research question would be ‘How many homeless women with substance use disorder live in the metro area?’
• Exploratory research seeks to find out how people get along in the setting under question, what meanings they give to their actions, and what issues concern them. An example research question would be ‘What are the barriers to homeless women with substance use disorder receiving treatment services?’
• Explanatory research seeks to identify causes and effects of social phenomena. It can be used to rule out other explanations for findings and show how two events are related to each other.  An explanatory research question would be ‘Why do women with substance use disorder become homeless?’
• Evaluation research describes or identifies the impact of social programs and policies. This type of research question could be ‘How effective was XYZ treatment-first program that combined housing and required drug/alcohol abstinence in keeping women with substance use disorder in stable housing 2 years after the program ended?’

Each of the above types of research can answer important questions about the population, setting or intervention being provided. This can help practitioners determine which option is most effective or cost-efficient or that clients are most likely to adhere to. In turn, this data allows social workers to make informed choices on what to keep in their practice, and what needs changing. 

How to build research skills while in school

There are a number of ways to build research skills while a student.  BSW and MSW programs require a research course, but there are other ways to develop these skills beyond a single class:

• Volunteer to help a professor working in an area of interest. Professors are often excited to share their knowledge and receive extra assistance from students with similar interests.
• Participate in student research projects where you’re the subject. These are most often found in psychology departments. You can learn a lot about the informed consent process and how data is collected by volunteering as a research participant.  Many of these studies also pay a small amount, so it’s an easy way to earn a bit of extra money while you’re on campus. 
• Create an independent study research project as an elective and work with a professor who is an expert in an area you’re interested in.  You’d design a research study, collect the data, analyze it, and write a report or possibly even an article you can submit to an academic journal.
• Some practicum programs will have you complete a small evaluation project or assist with a larger research project as part of your field education hours. 
• In MSW programs, some professors hire students to conduct interviews or enter data on their funded research projects. This could be a good part time job while in school.
• Research assistant positions are more common in MSW programs, and these pay for some or all your tuition in exchange for working a set number of hours per week on a funded research project.

How to build research skills while working as a social worker

Social service agencies are often understaffed, with more projects to complete than there are people to complete them.

Taking the initiative to volunteer to survey clients about what they want and need, conduct an evaluation on a program, or seeing if there is data that has been previously collected but not analyzed and review that data and write up a report can help you stand out from your peers, be appreciated by management and other staff, and may even lead to a raise, a promotion, or even new job opportunities because of the skills you’ve developed.

Benefits of being a social worker with strong research skills

Social workers with strong research skills can have the opportunity to work on various projects, and at higher levels of responsibility. 

Many can be promoted into administration level positions after demonstrating they understand how to conduct, interpret and report research findings and apply those findings to improving the agency and their programs.

There’s also a level of confidence knowing you’re implementing proven strategies with your clients. 

Social work research jobs

There are a number of ways in which you can blend interests in social work and research. A quick search on Glassdoor.com and Indeed.com retrieved the following positions related to social work research:

• Research Coordinator on a clinical trial offering psychosocial supportive interventions and non-addictive pain treatments to minimize opioid use for pain.
• Senior Research Associate leading and overseeing research on a suite of projects offered in housing, mental health and corrections.
• Research Fellow in a school of social work
• Project Policy Analyst for large health organization
• Health Educator/Research Specialist to implement and evaluate cancer prevention and screening programs for a health department
• Research Interventionist providing Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for insomnia patients participating in a clinical trial
• Research Associate for Child Care and Early Education
• Social Services Data Researcher for an organization serving adults with disabilities.
• Director of Community Health Equity Research Programs evaluating health disparities.

No matter your population or area of interest, you’d likely be able to find a position that integrated research and social work. 

Social work practice and research are and should remain intertwined. This is the only way we can know what questions to ask about the programs and services we are providing, and ensure our interventions are effective. 

There are many opportunities to develop research skills while in school and while working in the field, and these skills can lead to some interesting positions that can make a real difference to clients, families and communities. 

Drake, R. E., Goldman, H., Leff, H. S., Lehman, A. F., Dixon, L., Mueser, K. T., et al. (2001). Implementing evidence-based practices in routine mental health service settings. Psychiatric Services, 52(2), 179-182. 

Engel, R.J., & Schutt, R.K. (2017). The Practice of Research in Social Work. Sage.

National Association of Social Workers. (n.d). Evidence Based Practice. Retrieved from: https://www.socialworkers.org/News/Research-Data/Social-Work-Policy-Research/Evidence-Based-Practice

Open Social Work

Building information equity in social work with open educational resources and open access to research

Open Textbooks for Social Work Education

This is a curated list of social work textbooks available at OER repositories from October 2021 conducted by Matt DeCarlo and Anne Marie Gruber. They are primarily curated for higher education in the United States. If you know of any open textbooks in social work that we may have missed, please contact us via email at this site.

These are not the only OERs relevant to social work! Please see our: – Curated list of open access books from commercial publishers . – Curated list of toolkits, workbooks, and other open educational resources. [under construction] – List of announced and forthcoming social work open textbooks

Subject headings

• Community organizing (1)
• Field education (1)
• Human development (6)
• Social science theories (4)
• International social work (2)
• Introduction to social work (2)
• Management (5)
• Communication (3)
• Substance use (3)
• Research methods (6)
• Statistics (3)
• Statistics software (4)
• School social work (2)
• Social justice (8)
• Sustainability (3)

Guides for faculty

• Teaching note: Adapting, adopting, and creating open textbooks
• Introduction to OER
• 5R’s of OER
• OER starter kit
• OER starter kit workbook
• Open Education Network training
• Rubrics for evaluating OER
• Open Textbook Library
• Pressbooks Directory
• OER Commons
• Open Education Network
• OpenEd Conference
• Rebus Community

Community organizing

The community tool box.

Millions of people use the Community Tool Box each year to get help taking action, teaching, and training others in organizing for community development. Dive in to find help assessing community needs and resources, addressing social determinants of health, engaging stakeholders, action planning, building leadership, improving cultural competency, planning an evaluation, and sustaining your efforts over time.

Field education

Succeeding at your internship: a handbook written for and with students.

There are several textbooks for students whose majors include internships in human services, broadly defi­­­ned, such as case management, counseling, criminal justice, and social work. hat work led to a structured narrative about basic practical topics, such as finding an internship, getting started there, making effective use of supervision, understanding ethics, appreciating cultural diversity, becoming competent, and completing the internship. The text includes descriptions, suggestions, and exercises. It may be used as either a primary course text or, due to its relative brevity, a supplemental one.

Human Behavior in the Social Environment

Human development, child growth and development.

This text is a presentation of how and why children grow, develop, and learn. We will look at how we change physically over time from conception through adolescence. We examine cognitive change, or how our ability to think and remember changes over the first 20 years or so of life. And we will look at how our emotions, psychological state, and social relationships change throughout childhood and adolescence.

Child, Family, and Community

Over the years researchers have found the necessity to develop theories of behavior that are specific to family settings. These theories have been developed by people with a variety of areas of emphasis, from family therapists to gerontologists to child development specialists. In this chapter we will briefly discuss six such theories: Bioecological Model, Family Systems, Functionalism, Conflict Theory, Symbolic Interactionism, and Psychological Perspectives.

Human behavior in the social environment I

This textbook will explore theoretical perspectives in Social Work to help provide a foundation for organizing thoughts about client needs and issues they are seeking supports for. Theories will then be connected to important developmental, social, and cultural issues that present throughout each stage of life to create an overall picture of a client’s experience and how we can use this information to have a better understanding of how people we work with are influenced and why. Knowledge of typical development in each stage of life will also inform the Social Worker if any other supports, resources, or services may be needed.

Human Development

This course provides a bird’s eye view of major milestones and developmental tasks during each age period, starting at conception and ending with old age. As you discover age periods that you would like to learn more about, we invite you take any of the 400-level series of developmental courses covering specific developmental periods in more depth: Infancy, Early Childhood Development, Child Psychology, Adolescent Development, and Adult Development and Aging.

Human Development Life Span

Growth and development through the lifespan including physical, social, cognitive and neurological development. This course covers topics in each of these areas and provides an overview on subjects such as day care, education, disabilities, parenting, types of families, gender identity and roles, career decisions, illnesses and treatments, aging, retirement, generativity, and dying.

Lifespan Development: A Psychological Perspective

This textbook introduces the idea of lifespan development from a psychological perspective.

I ntercultural Communication

Intercultural Communication examines culture as a variable in interpersonal and collective communication. It explores the opportunities and problems arising from similarities and differences in communication patterns, processes, and codes among various cultural groups. It explores cultural universals, social categorization, stereotyping and discrimination, with a focus on topics including race, ethnicity, social class, religion, gender and sexuality as they relate to communication.

Beyond Race: Cultural Influences on Human Social Life

The book is supported by discussion of relevant theory and research in cultural sociology. Beyond Race: Cultural Influences on Human Social Life has stressed learner-centered teaching with the instructor taking on the role of a facilitator of learning. As such, it is expected the instructor will serve as the mediator between the content of this book and learners’ understanding of material on multiple and higher levels. This book does not offer a set of rules in teaching cultural sociology, but rather suggests content and applications to consider and modify as needed by the ever-changing dynamics of instructors and learners.

Human behavior in the social environment II

These materials will help students and instructors alike explore human behavior and how it is shaped and impacted by both traditional and non-traditional paradigms. This text will also support the reader in having a deeper understanding of how the environment, in all of its complexity, can affect individuals, families, groups, and communities.

It is my hope that the information contained in this book will help you, as a future social worker, approach client systems with empathy, understanding, and a compassionate curiosity that allows for comprehensive assessment, individualized approaches to treatment, and continuity of care.

Redesigning Lives: Learning How Space Impacts Residents in Affordable Supportive Housing Initiatives

Redesigning Lives: Learning How Space Impacts Residents in Affordable Supportive Housing Initiatives is a research project funded through a SSHRC Explore Grant. This research was a collaborative venture between the Faculty of Applied Science and Technology and the Faculty of Applied Health and Community Studies at Sheridan College. The goal of this research was to look at the impact that design can make to mental health and wellbeing and community-building through the lens of affordable and supportive housing. Bringing together the strengths of the two disciplines, this research looked at physical design and how it intersects with social determinants of health (SDOH).

International Social Work

Immigrant and refugee families: global perspectives on displacement and resettlement experiences.

Immigrant and Refugee Families: Global Perspectives on Displacement and Resettlement Experiences offers an interdisciplinary perspective on immigrant and refugee families’ challenges and resilience across multiple domains, including economic, political, health, and human rights. This new edition has been revised and updated from the original 2016 edition.

Intercultural learning: Critical preparation for international student travel

Intercultural learning: Critical preparation for international student travel aims to take students beyond practical preparation, to equip them with a critical lens through which to view and understand their international experiences. The book leads students toward a deeper understanding of culture and cultural difference through an exploration of challenging concepts such as imperialism, racism, privilege and intercultural practice.

As an adjunct to traditional approaches, the book adds a significant and valuable dimension to the process of preparing students for international study, increasing the potential for meaningful and transformative learning experiences.

Introduction to Social Work

Introduction to social work at ferris state.

This book was written by MSW students as their final project for their Capstone class. Students were each assigned a chapter of the book to write to show that they had achieved competency as a Master’s level social worker. Chapters were assigned based on student interest and experience in certain areas of the field.

Social Work & Social Welfare: Modern Practice in a Diverse World

This text is intended for use in introductory social work classes at the college level. Chapter topics include the foundations and history of social work and social welfare; generalist social work; ethics and values; social policy; race & ethnicity; sex, sexism, & gender; LGBTQ+ clients; poverty and financial assistance; school social work; families and children; healthcare and disabilities; substance use; mental health; criminal justice; and older clients.

A n Open Guide to IMC [integrated marketing & communications]

This Guide has been created for those with the fewest number of resources and the smallest of budgets. It is dedicated to educators, activists, non-profits, charities, advocacy groups, and social justice leaders who are putting in the work to make our world a better place. It was created by 34 Kwantlen Polytechnic University students during the summer of 2020.

Guidelines for Improving the Effectiveness of Boards of Directors of Nonprofit Organizations

The purpose of this book is to help boards of directors of nonprofit organizations improve their performance after completing the online board self-assessment tool found at http://www.boardcheckup.com . However, it can also be used as a stand-alone resource for any board seeking to enhance its effectiveness in that it also contains the diagnostic questions on which the online tool is based.

Management Communication

Communication is the heart of business. Short emails, complex reports, private chats, impassioned pitches, formal presentations, and team meetings move information and ideas around an organization, define strategy, and drive decisions. Business communication is concise, direct, clear, and compelling.

Organizational Behavior

This OpenStax resource aligns to introductory courses in Organizational Behavior. The text presents the theory, concepts, and applications with particular emphasis on the impact that individuals and groups can have on organizational performance and culture. An array of recurring features engages students in entrepreneurial thinking, managing change, using tools/technology, and responsible management.

Principles of Management

Principles of Management  is designed to meet the scope and sequence requirements of the introductory course on management. This is a traditional approach to management using the leading, planning, organizing, and controlling approach. Management is a broad business discipline, and the Principles of Management course covers many management areas such as human resource management and strategic management, as well as behavioral areas such as motivation. No one individual can be an expert in all areas of management, so an additional benefit of this text is that specialists in a variety of areas have authored individual chapters.

Political Ideologies and Worldviews: An Introduction

Political Ideologies and Worldviews: An Introduction takes a “pluralist” approach and, in addition to being the first open textbook on its subject, also pushes back against the Eurocentric tendencies of standard textbooks by including chapters on Indigenous worldviews and Confucianism. Providing the latest scholarship on “classical ideologies” (liberalism, conservatism, socialism, anarchism, etc.), the textbook also includes innovative chapters on populism, feminism, and multiculturalism, as well as looking at the future of ideologies in a globalized world. Joining together scholars from Canada and beyond, the text also contains discussion questions to help students and readers to think further.

Social problems: Continuity and change

Social Problems: Continuity and Change is a realistic but motivating look at the many issues that are facing our society today. As this book’s subtitle, Continuity and Change, implies, social problems are persistent, but they have also improved in the past and can be improved in the present and future, provided that our nation has the wisdom and will to address them.

State and Local Government and Politics: Prospects for Sustainability – 2nd Edition

Our book represents a unique opportunity for three generations of scholars to reflect upon and collectively consider their decades’ long research, and the meaning of that research to both the broader society and to students of contemporary politics. Nicholas Lovrich served as a graduate school mentor to Brent Steel, and Brent in turn mentored Christopher A. Simon as an undergraduate and guided him to study with Lovrich. Steel and Lovrich have collaborated on research for over 30 years, while Simon has frequently collaborated with Steel and Lovrich for nearly 20 years.

Sustaining the commons

In this book you will learn about institutions–the rules and norms that guide the interactions among us. Those rules and norms can be found from traffic rules, rules in sports, regulations on when and where alcohol can be consumed, to constitutional rules that define who can become president of the United States of America. Rules and norms guide us to cooperative outcomes of so-called collective action problems. If we rely on voluntary contributions only to get anything done, this may not lead to the best results. But research also shows that coercion of people to comply to strict rules do not necessary lead to good outcomes. What combination of sticks and carrots is needed to be successful to solve collective action problems such as sustaining the commons?

Wellbeing, freedom, and social justice: The capability approach re-examined

Wellbeing, Freedom and Social Justice: The Capability Approach Re-Examined is both an introduction to the capability approach and a thorough evaluation of the challenges and disputes that have engrossed the scholars who have developed it. Ingrid Robeyns offers her own illuminating and rigorously interdisciplinary interpretation, arguing that by appreciating the distinction between the general capability approach and more specific capability theories or applications we can create a powerful and flexible tool for use in a variety of academic disciplines and fields of policymaking.

The Palgrave Handbook of Family Policy

Uses a multilevel structure to combine insights on family outcomes. Examines supra-national organisations such as the European Commission, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the World Bank (WB), the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the United Nations (UN). Brings together representatives from various academic communities to form a coherent, interdisciplinary, cutting-edge collection

Communication

Interpersonal communication: a mindful approach to relationships.

Interpersonal Communication: A Mindful Approach to Relationships  helps readers examine their own one-on-one communicative interactions using a mindfulness lens. The writing team of Jason S. Wrench, Narissra M. Punyanunt-Carter, and Katherine Thweatt incorporates the latest communication theory and research to help students navigate everyday interpersonal interactions. The 14 chapters in this book cover topics typically taught in an undergraduate interpersonal communication course: family interactions, interpersonal dynamics, language, listening, nonverbal communication, and romantic relationships, as well as exploring emerging areas such as self-compassion, body positivity, friendships, and “the dark side”. The writing takes on a purposefully informal tone to engage readers. Each chapter is broken into different sections that have unique instructional outcomes, key takeaways, and exercises, and concludes with real-world case studies and sample quiz questions. Also included is  an extensive glossary with over 350 definitions.

Message Processing: The Science of Creating Understanding

Small Group Communication: Forming & Sustaining Teams

Small Group Communication: Forming & Sustaining Teams is an interdisciplinary textbook focused on communication in groups and teams. This textbook aims to provide students with theories, concepts, and skills they can put into practice to form and sustain successful groups across a variety of contexts.

Contemporary Families: An Equity Lens

This openly licensed text, created with students, approaches the current status of contemporary families in the U.S. from an equity lens. It asks and answers the questions “What do families need?” and “How do society and institutions support or get in the way of families getting what they need?”

Parenting & Family Diversity Issues

This book has been created for students and all individuals who work with children and families (e.g., educators, parents, caregivers, direct support workers, etc.) in diverse contexts.  It is imperative to understand how and what factors may influence child outcomes across the lifespan. Therefore, key concepts related to parenting, child-rearing, care-giving, and parenting education are outlined in this textbook to provide historical, theoretical, and practical perspectives across vast settings and developmental domains. 

A primer on social work practice evaluation: How to participate in the process of evidence-based practice

This primer supports social workers in learning the basics of evaluation as it relates to engaging in evidence-based practice at the micro, mezzo and macro levels. It is designed for students who have already had an introductory research methods course who are now engaged in an evaluation project or course.

Abnormal Psychology – 2nd Edition

The book tackles the difficult topic of mental disorders in 15 modules. This journey starts by discussing what abnormal behavior is by attempting to understand what normal behavior is. Models of abnormal psychology and clinical assessment, diagnosis, and treatment are then discussed. With these three modules completed, the authors next explore several classes of mental disorders in 5 blocks. Block 1 covers mood, trauma and stressor related, and dissociative disorders. Block 2 covers anxiety, somatic symptom, and obsessive-compulsive disorders. Block 3 covers eating and substance-related and addictive disorders. Block 4 tackles schizophrenia spectrum and personality disorders. Finally, Block 5 investigates neurocognitive disorders and then ends with a discussion of contemporary issues in psychopathology. Disorders are covered by discussing their clinical presentation and DSM Criteria, epidemiology, comorbidity, etiology, and treatment options.

Introduction to Community Psychology

This textbook will show you how to comprehensively analyze, investigate, and address escalating problems of economic inequality, violence, substance abuse, homelessness, poverty, and racism. It will provide you with perspectives and tools to partner with community members and organizations to promote a fair and equitable allocation of resources and opportunities.

Social Work, Sociometry, and Psychodrama: Experiential Approaches for Group Therapists, Community Leaders, and Social Workers

Is the first book on the intersection of the fields of social work, sociometry, and psychodrama. Provides an overview of integrated sociometry and psychodrama tools into practice. Summarizes Moreno’s work on sociometry, psychodrama, and group psychotherapy.

Substance use

Drugs, health & behavior.

In this open textbook, you will find seven chapters. What are Drugs? A Brief Introduction How the Body Works in Relation to Drugs Types of Drugs Commonly Misused Prescriptions, Over The Counter Medications, and Supplements Law, Regulation, and Social Policy Use, Abuse, Addiction & Treatment Prevention

Foundations of Addiction Studies

In this book, we want to bring to life the core concepts at the heart of addiction. You may have friends or family members struggling with an addiction, or you yourself may have problems with addiction. You might be interested in working to help people in recovery, or you are simply curious to know more about this issue. Whatever the case, this book will introduce key terminology and research to help you define, discuss, diagnose, and deal with this problem.

Treatment of Addictions, Individual and Group

The Treatment of Addictions, Individual and Group Alternative Training online textbook has been developed as a resource for students in the Chemical Dependency Professional Alternative Training courses at Whatcom Community College. This online textbook hosts a variety of learning resources, such as articles, links to websites, webinars, videos, and infographics that relate to course topics. This text covers evidenced based approaches and systems of care in individual and group addiction treatment. Systems of care, historical models, healthy system recovery, and new peer supports are explored.

Domestic Violence in Immigrant Communities: Case Studies

“Domestic Violence in Immigrant Communities: Case Studies” is a freely accessible eCampus Ontario Pressbook containing case studies of immigrant women experiencing domestic violence to be used as educational materials. The book highlights the complexity of domestic violence cases in immigrant communities and the different legal processes that these women encounter in seeking justice and the challenges they face in relation to re-establishing their own lives and the lives of their children. The book contains questions for reflection; a description of legal processes involved in DV cases, and a glossary of the terms used throughout the case studies.

Trauma-Informed Care in Behavioral Health Services

This Treatment Improvement Protocol (TIP) is divided into three parts: • Part 1: A Practical Guide for the Provision of Behavioral Health Services • Part 2: An Implementation Guide for Behavioral Health Program Administrators • Part 3: A Review of the Literature

Making Sense of a Global Pandemic: Relationship Violence & Working Together Towards a Violence Free Society

This on-line book provides a wealth of information on relationship violence focusing amongst other things on definitions; the scope of the problem, theoretical frameworks, interventions and prevention strategies. It provides information on legal statutes (Provincial; Federal and International) and contains numerous links to additional resources to inform the reader. The book also highlights some emerging issues such as the importance of cultural safety; relationship violence in the work place and on post-secondary campuses. I was also interested to read the section on male victims and the dearth of services available to this segment of the population. Similarly, the importance of engaging male perpetrators if we are to effect meaningful and lasting change at a societal level.

Trauma and Resilience Among Displaced Populations: A Sociocultural Exploration

Includes cases based on the author’s own 10-year experience working in emergency contexts with displaced populations in 11 countries across the world. Focuses on the mental health of displaced populations from a uniquely psychological, sociocultural, and ecological perspective. Provides practical applications for non-specialist professionals working with displaced populations in complex institutional systems

Research methods

Foundations of social work research.

This textbook was created to provide an introduction to research methods for BSW and MSW students, with particular emphasis on research and practice relevant to students at the University of Texas at Arlington. It provides an introduction to social work students to help evaluate research for evidence-based practice and design social work research projects. It can be used with its companion, A Guidebook for Social Work Literature Reviews and Research Questions by Rebecca L. Mauldin and Matthew DeCarlo, or as a stand-alone textbook.

Graduate research methods in social work: A project-based approach

Our textbook guides graduate social work students step by step through the research process from conceptualization to dissemination. We center cultural humility, information literacy, pragmatism, and ethics and values as core components of social work research.

Scientific Inquiry in Social Work

As an introductory textbook for social work students studying research methods, this book guides students through the process of creating a research project. Students will learn how to discover a researchable topic that is interesting to them, examine scholarly literature, formulate a proper research question, design a quantitative or qualitative study to answer their question, carry out the design, interpret quantitative or qualitative results, and disseminate their findings to a variety of audiences. Examples are drawn from the author’s practice and research experience, as well as topical articles from the literature.

Social science research: Principles, methods and practices

This book is designed to introduce doctoral and graduate students to the process of scientific research in the social sciences, business, education, public health, and related disciplines. This book is based on my lecture materials developed over a decade of teaching the doctoral-level class on Research Methods at the University of South Florida. The target audience for this book includes Ph.D. and graduate students, junior researchers, and professors teaching courses on research methods, although senior researchers can also use this book as a handy and compact reference.

Research Methods in Psychology: 4th edition

A comprehensive textbook for research methods classes. A peer-reviewed inter-institutional project.

Doing Human Service Ethnography

Human service work is performed in many places – hospitals, shelters, households – and is characterised by a complex mixture of organising principles, relations and rules. Using ethnographic methods, researchers can investigate these site-specific complexities, providing multi-dimensional and compelling analyses. Bringing together both theoretical and practical material, this book shows researchers how ethnography can be carried out within human service settings. It provides an invaluable guide on how to apply ethnographic creativeness and offers a more humanistic and context-sensitive approach in the field of health and social care to generating valid knowledge about today’s service work.

A Quick Guide to Quantitative Research in the Social Sciences

This resource is intended as an easy-to-use guide for anyone who needs some quick and simple advice on quantitative aspects of research in social sciences, covering subjects such as education, sociology, business, nursing. If you area qualitative researcher who needs to venture into the world of numbers, or a student instructed to undertake a quantitative research project despite a hatred for maths, then this booklet should be a real help.

Statistics Video Textbook

This video textbook covers the main topics in an introductory statistics course. It focuses on visualizing the core logic behind how inferential testing works. The core logic is visualized by showing the relationships among three kinds of distributions: (1) distributions of observed sample data, (b) sampling distributions, and (c) population distributions. After laying the conceptual foundations (e.g., variables, histograms, z tables), the core logic is explained for the z test, t tests, ANOVAs, correlation, and regression. Chi square tests are also introduced at a basic level. The content emphasizes statistics in psychology, but its relevance is general because statistics are the same across fields.

Collaborative Statistics

Collaborative Statistics was written by Barbara Illowsky and Susan Dean, faculty members at De Anza College in Cupertino, California. The textbook was developed over several years and has been used in regular and honors-level classroom settings and in distance learning classes. Courses using this textbook have been articulated by the University of California for transfer of credit. The textbook contains full materials for course offerings, including expository text, examples, labs, homework, and projects. A Teacher’s Guide is currently available in print form and on the Connexions site at and supplemental course materials including additional problem sets and video lectures are available. The on-line text for each of these collections collections will meet the Section 508 standards for accessibility.

Statistics Software

Learning statistics with jasp.

Learning Statistics with JASP is a free textbook covering the basics of statistical inference for beginners in psychology and related applied disciplines. It uses the free software package JASP. Written in a lively, conversational style, it provides the reader with a perfect balance of readability and rigor, and gives students a modern view of statistical inference in the psychological and behavioral sciences.

Learning Statistics with R: A tutorial for psychology students and other beginners

Learning Statistics with R  covers the contents of an introductory statistics class, as typically taught to undergraduate psychology students, focusing on the use of the R statistical software. The book discusses how to get started in R as well as giving an introduction to data manipulation and writing scripts. From a statistical perspective, the book discusses descriptive statistics and graphing first, followed by chapters on probability theory, sampling and estimation, and null hypothesis testing. After introducing the theory, the book covers the analysis of contingency tables, t-tests, ANOVAs and regression. Bayesian statistics are covered at the end of the book.

Quantitative Research Methods for Political Science, Public Policy and Public Administration (With Applications in R)

The focus of this book is on using quantitative research methods to test hypotheses and build theory in political science, public policy and public administration. It is designed for advanced undergraduate courses, or introductory and intermediate graduate-level courses. The first part of the book introduces the scientific method, then covers research design, measurement, descriptive statistics, probability, inference, and basic measures of association. The second part of the book covers bivariate and multiple linear regression using the ordinary least squares, the calculus and matrix algebra that are necessary for understanding bivariate and multiple linear regression, the assumptions that underlie these methods, and then provides a short introduction to generalized linear models.

R for Data Science

This is the website for “R for Data Science”. This book will teach you how to do data science with R: You’ll learn how to get your data into R, get it into the most useful structure, transform it, visualise it and model it. In this book, you will find a practicum of skills for data science. Just as a chemist learns how to clean test tubes and stock a lab, you’ll learn how to clean data and draw plots—and many other things besides. These are the skills that allow data science to happen, and here you will find the best practices for doing each of these things with R. You’ll learn how to use the grammar of graphics, literate programming, and reproducible research to save time. You’ll also learn how to manage cognitive resources to facilitate discoveries when wrangling, visualising, and exploring data. **This Book is licensed under a No-Derivatives license that does not allow for revising, remixing…basically anything other than redistributing and accessing this resource.

SPSS 23: A Basic Tutorial

This book is intended for those who want to learn the basics of SPSS. It can be used as a text in a class or by those working independently. Each chapter has instructions that guide you through a series of problems, as well as graphics showing you what your screen should look like at various steps in the process. There are also exercises at the end of each chapter for further practice and more exercises and teaching modules are on the Teaching Resources page of the Social Science Research and Instructional Center (SSRIC) website.

School Social Work

Trauma-informed school practices: building expertise to transform schools.

The primary focus is on identifying and applying trauma-informed educator competencies needed to transform districts, schools, educators, classrooms, and the field of education itself, while also including community members such as parents and board members in these processes – a total system makeover. At the conclusion of this text, the student, educator, or mental health professional will have a deeper understanding of what trauma-informed practice requires of them. This includes practical strategies on how to transform our learning communities in response to the devastating effect of unmitigated stress and trauma on our student’s ability to learn and thrive throughout the lifespan.

Trauma Informed Behaviour Support: A Practical Guide to Developing Resilient Learners

If we want to impact the world of children who have experienced trauma then we must change not only ourselves and our classroom, but we must change our schools, our organisations, and our systems of care for children. We must all speak out for these children who have no voice to bring awareness of new educational and mental health approaches to children who will become tomorrow’s failed adults unless they receive our understanding and our help.

Social Justice

Introduction to design equity.

Why do affluent, liberal, and design-rich cities like Minneapolis have some of the biggest racial disparities in the country? How can designers help to create more equitable communities? Introduction to Design Equity, an open access book for students and professionals, maps design processes and products against equity research to highlight the pitfalls and potentials of design as a tool for building social justice.

Introduction to Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies

This textbook introduces key feminist concepts and analytical frameworks used in the interdisciplinary Women, Gender, Sexualities field. It unpacks the social construction of knowledge and categories of difference, processes and structures of power and inequality, with a focus on gendered labor in the global economy, and the historical development of feminist social movements. The book emphasizes feminist sociological approaches to analyzing structures of power, drawing heavily from empirical feminist research.

Global Women’s Issues: Women in the World Today

We cannot solve global challenges unless women participate fully in efforts to find solutions. Female participation in the private sector is a crucial economic driver for societies worldwide. Economic security benefits every facet of a woman’s life, with positive effects on the health, education and vitality of families. Learn about women who are changing their societies for the better. This book is based on the twelve critical areas of concern identified in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995.

Slavery to Liberation: The African American Experience

Slavery to Liberation: The African American Experience gives instructors, students, and general readers a comprehensive and up-to-date account of African Americans’ cultural and political history, economic development, artistic expressiveness, and religious and philosophical worldviews in a critical framework. It offers sound interdisciplinary analysis of selected historical and contemporary issues surrounding the origins and manifestations of White supremacy in the United States. By placing race at the center of the work, the book offers significant lessons for understanding the institutional marginalization of Blacks in contemporary America and their historical resistance and perseverance.

Supporting Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities & Mental Illness: What Caregivers Need to Know

This multidisciplinary resource develops topics of interest to all those who care about and for individuals with co-occurring intellectual disabilities and mental illness. Each chapter presents current evidence informed practice knowledge. Each topic is also presented with audio enabled text boxes emphasizing ‘Key Points for Caregivers.’ For those who are interested in background knowledge, we provided the comprehensive literature base. And, for those interested mainly in ‘what to do,’ we provided text box summaries for reading and listening.

The American LGBTQ Rights Movement: An Introduction

The American LGBTQ Rights Movement: An Introduction  is a peer-reviewed chronological survey of the LGBTQ fight for equal rights from the turn of the 20th century to the early 21st century. Illustrated with historical photographs, the book beautifully reveals the heroic people and key events that shaped the American LGBTQ rights movement. The book includes personal narratives to capture the lived experience from each era, as well as details of essential organizations, texts, and court cases that defined LGBTQ activism and advocacy.

Narrowed Lives: Meaning, Moral Value, and Profound Intellectual Disability

What is day-to-day life like for people with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities who live in group homes? How do they express their desires and wishes? How do care workers think about them and treat them? Do they have basic rights to activities most of us take for granted: activities like sociability, sexuality, and moral affirmation? Narrowed Lives is an illuminating portrait of what life is like in Finnish group homes where adults who have profound intellectual and multiple disabilities live their lives. Based upon ethnographic data, it documents how care workers strive to guarantee individuality and dignity against a backdrop of scarce resources and misguided policies. This book argues that the lives of people with profound disabilities need not be determined by their impairments. It calls for a re-evaluation of disability policy so that its underlying conviction of people with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities as equally valuable fellow humans would materialise in practice. This novel and accessible book combines ethnography and philosophy, and will be of interest to researchers and students in disability studies, special education and philosophy, as well as parents, professionals and policy makers.

Opening Eyes onto Inclusion and Diversity

In Australia and internationally much still needs to occur to promote inclusive practices in education and society with many educators not feeling equipped to recognise or appreciate diversity or cater effectively for inclusion (Hardy & Woodcock, 2015). It is into this space that a University of Southern Queensland team of researchers, practitioners, and academics intends to contribute an open textbook “Opening Eyes onto Inclusion and Diversity”. With embedded audio–visual components, the Open Textbook is designed to enhance the quality of the reader’s experience with each chapter posing key understandings underpinning inclusion and diversity. Readers are encouraged to answer questions on culture, special learning needs, varied educational contexts, gender diversity and more. The key expected outcome of this open textbook is to engage readers in making meaning of inclusion and diversity and applying their learning to their own individual contexts.

Sustainability

Climate toolkit: a resource manual for science and action – version 2.0.

The Climate Toolkit is a resource manual designed to help the reader navigate the complex and perplexing issue of climate change by providing tools and strategies to explore the underlying science. As such it contains a collection of activities that make use of readily available on-line resources developed by research groups and public agencies. These include web-based climate models, climate data archives, interactive atlases, policy papers, and “solution” catalogs. Unlike a standard textbook, it is designed to help readers do their own climate research and devise their own perspective rather than providing them with a script to assimilate and repeat.

Community resilience to climate change: Theory, research and practice

This reader is an Open Educational Resource, meant to accompany a graduate or higher-level undergraduate university course in climate change resilience, adaptation, and/or planning. While the material is geared toward students in urban and regional planning, it may also be of interest to students of urban studies, public health, geography, political science, sociology, risk management, and others.

Each section of this volume includes (1) an introductory summary, (2) a reading list with full text articles, (3) student exercises meant to enhance understanding and facilitate in-class discussion, and (4) additional discussion prompts or activities for instructors to use in class. The format of materials is intended to convey key concepts, while leaving ample space for student exploration, discourse, and creativity. Lessons may culminate in an applied, imaginative final project, a sample framework of which is provided at the end of Section VI.

Sustainability: A comprehensive foundation

With “Sustainability: A Comprehensive Foundation”, first and second-year college students are introduced to this expanding new field, comprehensively exploring the essential concepts from every branch of knowledge – including engineering and the applied arts, natural and social sciences, and the humanities. As sustainability is a multi-disciplinary area of study, the text is the product of multiple authors drawn from the diverse faculty of the University of Illinois: each chapter is written by a recognized expert in the field.

This text is designed to introduce the reader to the essential concepts of sustainability. This subject is of vital importance seeking as it does to uncover the principles of the long-term welfare of all the peoples of the planet but is only peripherally served by existing college textbooks.

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Scientific Inquiry in Social Work

(9 reviews)

Matthew DeCarlo, Radford University

Copyright Year: 2018

ISBN 13: 9781975033729

Publisher: Open Social Work Education

Language: English

Formats Available

Conditions of use.

Learn more about reviews.

Reviewed by Shannon Blajeski, Assistant Professor, Portland State University on 3/10/23

This book provides an introduction to research and inquiry in social work with an applied focus geared for the MSW student. The text covers 16 chapters, including several dedicated to understanding how to begin the research process, a chapter on... read more

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

This book provides an introduction to research and inquiry in social work with an applied focus geared for the MSW student. The text covers 16 chapters, including several dedicated to understanding how to begin the research process, a chapter on ethics, and then eight chapters dedicated to research methods. The subchapters (1-5 per chapter) are concise and focused while also being tied to current knowledge and events so as to hold the reader's attention. It is comprehensive, but some of the later chapters covering research methods as well as the final chapter seem a bit scant and could be expanded. The glossary at the end of each chapter is helpful as is the index that is always accessible from the left-hand drop-down menu.

Content Accuracy rating: 4

The author pulls in relevant current and recent public events to illustrate important points about social research throughout the book. Each sub-chapter reads as accurate. I did not come across any inaccuracies in the text, however I would recommend a change in the title of Chapter 15 as "real world research" certainly encompasses more than program evaluation, single-subject designs, and action research.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

Another major strength of this book is that it adds currency to engage the reader while also maintaining its relevance to research methods. None of the current events/recent events that are described seem dated nor will they fade from relevance in a number of years. In addition, the concise nature of the modules should make them easy to update when needed to maintain relevancy in future editions.

Clarity rating: 5

Clarity is a major strength of this textbook. As described in the interface section, this book is written to be clear and concise, without unnecessary extra text that detracts from the concise content provided in each chapter. Any lengthy excerpts are also very engaging which lends itself to a clear presentation of content for the reader.

Consistency rating: 5

The text and content seems to be presented consistently throughout the book. Terminology and frameworks are balanced with real-world examples and current events.

Modularity rating: 5

The chapters of this textbook are appropriately spaced and easily digestible, particularly for readers with time constraints. Each chapter contains 3-5 sub-chapters that build upon each other in a scaffolding style. This makes it simple for the instructor to assign each chapter (sometimes two) per weekly session as well as add in additional assigned readings to complement the text.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

The overall organization of the chapters flow well. The book begins with a typical introduction to research aimed at social work practitioners or new students in social work. It then moves into a set of chapters on beginning a research project, reviewing literature, and asking research questions, followed by a chapter on ethics. Next, the text transitions to three chapters covering constructs, measurement, and sampling, followed by five chapters covering research methods, and a closing chapter on dissemination of research. This is one of the more logically-organized research methods texts that I have used as an instructor.

Interface rating: 5

The modular chapters are easy to navigate and the interface of each chapter follows a standard presentation style with the reading followed by a short vocabulary glossary and references. This presentation lends itself to a familiarity for students that helps them become more efficient with completing reading assignments, even in short bursts of time. This is particularly important for online and returning learners who may juggle their assignment time with family and work obligations.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

No grammatical errors were noted.

Cultural Relevance rating: 4

At first glance at the table of contents, the book doesn't seem to be overtly committed to cultural representation, however, upon reading the chapters, it becomes clear that the author does try to represent and reference marginalized groups (e.g., women, individuals with disabilities, racial/ethnic/gender intersectionality) within the examples used. I also am very appreciative that the bottom of each introduction page for each chapter contains content trigger warnings for any possible topics that could be upsetting, e.g., substance abuse, violence.

As the author likely knows, social work students are eager to engage in learning that is current and relevant to their social causes. This book is written in a way that engages a non-researcher social worker into reading about research by weaving research information into topics that they might find compelling. It also does this in a concise way where short bits of pertinent information are presented, making the text accessible without needing to sustain long periods of attention. This is particularly important for online and returning learners who may need to sit with their readings in short bursts due to attending school while juggling work and family obligations.

Reviewed by Lynn Goerdt, Associate Professor, University of Wisconsin - Superior on 9/17/21

Text appears to be comprehensive in covering steps for typical SWK research class, taking students from the introduction of the purpose and importance of research to how to design and analyze research. Author covers the multitude of ways that... read more

Text appears to be comprehensive in covering steps for typical SWK research class, taking students from the introduction of the purpose and importance of research to how to design and analyze research. Author covers the multitude of ways that social workers engage in research as way of building knowledge and ways that social work practitioners conduct research to evaluate their practice, including outcome evaluation, single subject design, and action research. I particularly appreciated the last section on reporting research, which should be very practical.

Overall, content appears mostly accurate which few errors. Definitions and citations are mostly thorough and clear. Author does cite Wikipedia in at least one occasion which could be credible, depending on the source of the Wikipedia content. There were a few references within the text to comic or stories but the referenced material was not always apparent.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 4

The content of Scientific Inquiry for Social Work is relevant, as the field of social work research methods does not appear to change quickly, although there are innovations. The author referenced examples which appear to be recent and likely relatable to interests of current students. Primary area of innovation is in using technology for the collection and analysis of data, which could be expanded, particularly using social media for soliciting research participants.

Style is personable and content appears to be accessible, which is a unique attribute for a research textbook. Author uses first person in many instances, particularly in the beginning to present the content as relatable.

Format appears to be consistent in format and relative length. Each chapter includes learning objectives, content advisory (if applicable), key takeaways and glossary. Author uses color and text boxes to draw attention to these sections.

Modularity rating: 4

Text is divided into modules which could easily be assigned and reviewed in a class. The text modules could also be re-structured if desired to fit curricular uniqueness’s. Author uses images to illuminate the concepts of the module or chapter, but they often take about 1/3 of the page, which extends the size of the textbook quite a bit. Unclear if benefit of images outweighs additional cost if PDF version is printed.

Textbook is organized in a very logical and clear fashion. Each section appears to be approximately 6-10 pages in length which seems to be an optimal length for student attention and comprehension.

Interface rating: 4

There were some distortions of the text (size and visibility) but they were a fairly minor distraction and did not appear to reduce access to the content. Otherwise text was easy to navigate.

Grammatical Errors rating: 4

No grammatical errors were noted but hyperlinks to outside content were referenced but not always visible which occasionally resulted in an awkward read. Specific link may be in resources section of each chapter but occasionally they were also included in the text.

I did not recognize any text which was culturally insensitive or offensive. Images used which depicted people, appeared to represent diverse experiences, cultures, settings and persons. Did notice image depicting homelessness appeared to be stereotypical person sleeping on sidewalk, which can perpetuate a common perception of homelessness. Would encourage author to consider images representing a wider range of experiences of a social phenomena. Content advisories are used for each section, which is not necessarily cultural relevance but is respectful and recognizes the diversity of experiences and triggers that the readers may have.

Overall, I was very impressed and encouraged with the well organized content and thoughtful flow of this important textbook for social work students and instructors. The length and readability of each chapter would likely be appreciated by instructors as well as students, increasing the extent that the learning outcomes would be achieved. Teaching research is very challenging because the content and application can feel very intimidating. The author also has provided access to supplemental resources such as presentations and assignments.

Reviewed by elaine gatewood, Adjunct Faculty, Bridgewater State University on 6/15/21

The book provides concrete and clear information on using research as consumers, It provides a comprehensive review of each step to take to develop a research project from beginning to completion, with examples. read more

The book provides concrete and clear information on using research as consumers, It provides a comprehensive review of each step to take to develop a research project from beginning to completion, with examples.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

From my perspective, content is highly accurate in the field of learning research method and unbiased. It's all there!

The content is highly relevant and up-to-date in the field. The book is written and arranged in a way that its easy to follow along with adding updates.

The book is written in clear and concise. The book provides appropriate context for any jargon/technical terminology used along with examples which readers are able to follow along and understand.

The contents of the book flow quite well. The framework in the book is consistent.

The text appears easily adaptable for readers and the author also provides accompanying PowerPoint presentations; these are a good foundation tools for readers to use and implement.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 4

The contents of the book flow very well. Readers would be able to put into practice the key reading strategies shared in the book ) because its organization is laid out nicely

Interface rating: 3

The interface is generally good, but I was only able to download the .pdf. This may present issues for some student readers.

There are no grammatical errors.

The text was culturally relevant and provided diverse research and practice examples. The text could have benefited from sexamples of intersectional and anti-oppressive lenses for students to consider in their practice.

This text is a comprehensive introduction to research that can be easily adapted for a BSW/MSW research course.

Reviewed by Taylor Hall, Assistant Professor, Bridgewater State University on 6/30/20

This text is more comprehensive than the text I currently use in my Research Methods in Social Work course, which students have to pay for. This text not only covers both qualitative and quantitative research methods, but also all parts of the... read more

This text is more comprehensive than the text I currently use in my Research Methods in Social Work course, which students have to pay for. This text not only covers both qualitative and quantitative research methods, but also all parts of the research process from thinking about research ideas to questions all the way to evaluation after social work programs/policies have been employed.

Not much to say here- with research methods, things are black and white; it is or isn't. This content is accurate. I also like to way the content is explained in light of social work values and ethics. This is something our students can struggle with, and this is helpful in terms of showing why social work needs to pay attention to research.

There are upcoming changes to CSWE's competencies, therefore lots of text materials are going to need to be updated soon. Otherwise, case examples are pertinent and timely.

Clarity rating: 4

I think that research methods for social workers is a difficult field of study. Many go into the field to be clinicians, and few understand (off the bat) the importance of understanding methods of research. I think this textbook makes it clear to me, but hard to rate a 5 as I know from a student's perspective, lots of the terminology is so new.

Appears to be so- I was able to follow, seems consistent.

Yes- and I think this is a strong point of this text. This was easy to follow and read, and I could see myself easily divvying up different sections for students to work on in groups.

Yes- makes sense to me and the way I teach this course. I like the 30,000 ft view then honing in on specific types of research, all along the way explaining the different pieces of the research process and in writing a research paper.

I sometimes struggle with online platforms versus in person texts to read, and this OER is visually appealing- there is not too much text on the pages, it is spaced in a way that makes it easier to read. Colors are used well to highlight pertinent information.

Not something I found in this text.

Cultural Relevance rating: 3

This is a place where I feel the text could use some work. A nod to past wrongdoings in research methods on oppressed groups, and more of a discussion on social work's role in social justice with an eye towards righting the wrongs of the past. Updated language re: person first language, more diverse examples, etc.

This is a very useful text, and I am going to recommend my department check it out for future use, especially as many of our students are first gen and working class and would love to save money on textbooks where possible.

Reviewed by Olubunmi Oyewuwo-Gassikia, Assistant Professor, Northeastern Illinois University on 5/5/20

This text is an appropriate and comprehensive introduction to research methods for BSW students. It guides the reader through each stage of the research project, including identifying a research question, conducting and writing a literature... read more

This text is an appropriate and comprehensive introduction to research methods for BSW students. It guides the reader through each stage of the research project, including identifying a research question, conducting and writing a literature review, research ethics, theory, research design, methodology, sampling, and dissemination. The author explains complex concepts - such as paradigms, epistemology, and ontology - in clear, simple terms and through the use of practical, social work examples for the reader. I especially appreciated the balanced attention to quantitative and qualitative methods, including the explanation of data collection and basic analysis techniques for both. The text could benefit from the inclusion of an explanation of research design notations.

The text is accurate and unbiased. Additionally, the author effectively incorporates referenced sources, including sources one can use for further learning.

The content is relevant and timely. The author incorporates real, recent research examples that reflects the applicability of research at each level of social practice (micro, meso, and macro) throughout the text. The text will benefit from regular updates in research examples.

The text is written in a clear, approachable manner. The chapters are a reasonable length without sacrificing appropriate depth into the subject manner.

The text is consistent throughout. The author is effective in reintroducing previously explained terms from previous chapters.

The text appears easily adaptable. The instructions provided by the author on how to adapt the text for one's course are helpful to one who would like to use the text but not in its entirety. The author also provides accompanying PowerPoint presentations; these are a good foundation but will likely require tailoring based on the teaching style of the instructor.

Generally, the text flows well. However, chapter 5 (Ethics) should come earlier, preferably before chapter 3 (Reviewing & Evaluating the Literature). It is important that students understand research ethics as ethical concerns are an important aspect of evaluating the quality of research studies. Chapter 15 (Real-World Research) should also come earlier in the text, most suitably before or after chapter 7 (Design and Causality).

The interface is generally good, but I was only able to download the .pdf. The setup of the .pdf is difficult to navigate, especially if one wants to jump from chapter to chapter. This may present issues for the student reader.

The text was culturally relevant and provided diverse research and practice examples. The text could have benefited from more critical research examples, such as examples of research studies that incorporate intersectional and anti-oppressive lenses.

This text is a comprehensive introduction to research that can be easily adapted for a BSW level research course.

Reviewed by Smita Dewan, Assistant Professor, New York City College of Technology, Department of Human Services on 12/6/19

This is a very good introductory research methodology textbook for undergraduate students of social work or human services. For students who might be intimidated by social research, the text provides assurance that by learning basic concepts of... read more

Comprehensiveness rating: 4 see less

This is a very good introductory research methodology textbook for undergraduate students of social work or human services. For students who might be intimidated by social research, the text provides assurance that by learning basic concepts of research methodology, students will be better scholars and social work or human service practitioners. The content and flow of the text book supports a basic assignment of most research methodology courses which is to develop a research proposal or a research project. Each stage of research is explained well with many examples from social work practice that has the potential to keep the student engaged.

The glossary at the end of each chapter is very comprehensive but does not include the page number/s where the content is located. The glossary at the end of the book also lacks page numbers which might make it cumbersome for students seeking a quick reference.

The content is accurate and unbiased. Suggested exercises and prompts for students to engage in critical thinking and to identify biases in research that informs practice may help students understand the complexities of social research.

Content is up-to-date and concepts of research methodology presented is unlikely to be obsolete in the coming years. However, recent trends in research such as data mining, using algorithms for social policy and practice implications, privacy concerns, role of social media are topics that could be considered for inclusion in the forthcoming editions.

Content is presented very clearly for undergraduate students. Key takeaways and glossary for each section of the chapter is very useful for students.

Presentation of content, format and organization is consistent throughout the book.

Subsections within each chapter is very helpful for the students who might be assigned readings just in parts for the class.

Students would benefit from reading about research ethics right after the introductory chapter. I would also move Chapter 8 to right after the literature review which might inform creating and refining the research question. Content on evaluation research could also be moved up to follow the chapter on experimental designs. Regardless of the organization, the course instructors can assign chapters according to the course requirements.

PDF version of the book is very easy to use especially as students can save a copy on their computers and do not have to be online. Charts and tables are well presented but some of the images/photographs do not necessarily serve to enhance learning. Image attributions could be provided at the end of the chapter instead of being listed under the glossary. Students might also find it useful to be able to highlight the content and make annotations. This requires that students sign-in. Students should be able to highlight and annotate a downloaded version through Adobe Reader.

I did not find any grammatical errors.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

Content is not insensitive or offensive in any way. Supporting examples in chapters are very diverse. Students would benefit from some examples of international research (both positive and negative examples) of protection of human subjects.

Reviewed by Jill Hoffman, Assistant Professor, Portland State University on 10/29/19

This text includes 16 chapters that cover content related to the process of conducting research. From identifying a topic and reviewing the literature, to formulating a question, designing a study, and disseminating findings, the text includes... read more

This text includes 16 chapters that cover content related to the process of conducting research. From identifying a topic and reviewing the literature, to formulating a question, designing a study, and disseminating findings, the text includes research basics that most other introductory social work research texts include. Content on ethics, theory, and to a lesser extent evaluation, single-subject design, and action research are also included. There is a glossary at the end of the text that includes information on the location of the terms. There is a practice behaviors index, but not an index in the traditional sense. If using the text electronically, search functions make it easy to find necessary information despite not having an index. If using a printed version, this would be more difficult. The text includes examples to illustrate concepts that are relevant to settings in which social workers might work. As most other introductory social work research texts, this book appears to come from a mainly positivist view. I would have appreciated more of a discussion related to power, privilege, and oppression and the role these play in the research topics that get studied and who benefits, along with anti-oppressive research. Related to evaluations, a quick mention of logic models would be helpful.

The information appears to be accurate and error free. The language in the text seems to emphasize "right/wrong" choices/decisions instead of highlighting the complexities of research and practice. Using gender-neutral pronouns would also make the language more inclusive.

Content appears to be up-to-date and relevant. Any updating would be straightforward to carry out. I found at least one link that did not work (e.g., NREPP) so if you use this text it will be important to check and make sure things are updated.

The content is clearly written, using examples to illustrate various concepts. I appreciated prompts for questions throughout each chapter in order to engage students in the content. Key terms are bolded, which helps to easily identify important points.

Information is presented in a consistent manner throughout the text.

Each chapter is divided into subsections that help with readability. It is easy to pick and choose various pieces of the text for your course if you're not using the entire thing.

There are many ways you can organize a social work research text. Personally, I prefer to talk about ethics and theory early on, so that students have this as a framework as they read about other's studies and design their own. In the case of this text, I'd put those two chapters right after chapter 1. As others have suggested, I'd also move up the content on research questions, perhaps after chapter 4.

In the online version, no significant interface issues arose. The only thing that would be helpful is to have chapter titles clearly presented when navigating through the text in the online version. For example, when you click through to a new chapter, the title simply says "6.0 Chapter introduction." In order to see the chapter title you have to click into the contents tab. Not a huge issue but could help with navigating the online version. In the pdf version, the links in the table of contents allowed me to navigate through to various sections. I did notice that some of the external links were not complete (e.g., on page 290, the URL is linked as "http://baby-").

Cultural representation in the text is similar to many other introductory social work research texts. There's more of an emphasis on white, western, cis-gendered individuals, particularly in the images. In examples, it appeared that only male/female pronouns were used.

Reviewed by Monica Roth Day, Associate Professor, Social Work, Metropolitan State University (Saint Paul, Minnesota) on 12/26/18

The book provides concrete and clear information on using research as consumers, then developing research as producers of knowledge. It provides a comprehensive review of each step to take to develop a research project from beginning to... read more

The book provides concrete and clear information on using research as consumers, then developing research as producers of knowledge. It provides a comprehensive review of each step to take to develop a research project from beginning to completion, with appropriate examples. More specific social work links would be helpful as students learn more about the field and the uses of research.

The book is accurate and communicates information and largely without bias. Numerous examples are provided from varied sources, which are then used to discuss potential for bias in research. The addition of critical race theory concepts would add to this discussion, to ground students in the importance of understanding implicit bias as researchers and ways to develop their own awareness.

The book is highly relevant. It provides historical and current examples of research which communicate concepts using accessible language that is current to social work. The text is written so that updates should be easy. Links need to be updated on a regular basis.

The book is accessible for students at it uses common language to communicate concepts while helping students build their research vocabulary. Terminology is communicate both within the text and in glossaries, and technical terms are minimally used.

The book is consistent in its use of terminology and framework. It follows a pattern of development, from consuming research to producing research. The steps are predictable and walk students through appropriate actions to take.

The book is easily readable. Each chapter is divided in sections that are easy to navigate and understand. Pictures and tables are used to support text.

Chapters are in logical order and follow a common pattern.

When reading the book online, the text was largely free of interface issues. As a PDF, there were issues with formatting. Be aware that students who may wish to download the book into a Kindle or other book reader may experience issues.

The text was grammatically correct with no misspellings.

While the book is culturally relevant, it lacks the application of critical race theory. While students will learn about bias in research, critical race theory would ground students in the importance of understanding implicit bias as researchers and ways to develop their own awareness. It would also help students understand why the background of researchers is important in relation to the ways of knowing.

Reviewed by Jennifer Wareham, Associate Professor, Wayne State University on 11/30/18

The book provides a comprehensive introduction to research methods from the perspective of the discipline of Social Work. The book borrows heavily from Amy Blackstone’s Principles of Sociological Inquiry – Qualitative and Quantitative Methods open... read more

The book provides a comprehensive introduction to research methods from the perspective of the discipline of Social Work. The book borrows heavily from Amy Blackstone’s Principles of Sociological Inquiry – Qualitative and Quantitative Methods open textbook. The book is divided into 16 chapters, covering: differences in reasoning and scientific thought, starting a research project, writing a literature review, ethics in social science research, how theory relates to research, research design, causality, measurement, sampling, survey research, experimental design, qualitative interviews and focus groups, evaluation research, and reporting research. Some of the more advanced concepts and topics are only covered at superficial level, which limits the intended population of readers to high school students, undergraduate students, or those with no background in research methods. Since the book is geared toward Social Work undergraduate students, the chapters and content address methodologies commonly used in this field, but ignore methodologies that may be more popular in other social science fields. For example, the material on qualitative methods is narrow and focuses on commonly used qualitative methods in Social Work. In addition, the chapter on evaluation is limited to a general overview of evaluation research, which could be improved with more in-depth discussion of different types of evaluation (e.g., needs assessment, evaluability assessment, process evaluation, impact/outcomes evaluation) and real-world examples of different types of evaluation implemented in Social Work. Overall, the author provides examples that are easy for practitioners in Social Work to understand, which are also easily relatable for students in similar disciplines such as criminal justice. The book provides a glossary of key terms. There is no index; however, users can search for terms using the find (Ctrl-F) function in the PDF version of the book.

Overall, the content inside this book is accurate, error-free, and unbiased. However, the content is limited to the Social Work perspective, which may be considered somewhat biased or inaccurate from the perspective of others in different disciplines.

The book describes classic examples used in most texts on social science research methods. It also includes contemporary and relevant examples. Some of the content (such as web addresses and contemporary news pieces) will need to be updated every few years. The text is written and arranged in such a way that any necessary updates should be relatively easy and straightforward to implement.

The book is written in clear and accessible prose. The book provides appropriate context for any jargon/technical terminology used. Readers from any social science discipline should be able to understand the content and context of the material presented in the book.

The framework and use of terminology in the book are consistent.

This book is highly modular. The author has even improved upon the modularity of the book from Blackstone’s open text (which serves as the basis of the present text). Each chapter is divided into short, related subsections. The design of the chapters and their subsections make it easy to divide the material into units of study across a semester or quarter of instruction.

Generally, the book is organized in a similar manner as other texts on social science research methods. However, the organization could be improved slightly. Chapters 2 through 4 describe the process of beginning a research project and conducting a literature review. Chapter 8 describes refining a research question. This chapter could be moved to follow the Chapter 4. Chapter 12 describes experimental design, while Chapter 15 provides a description and examples of evaluation research. Since evaluation research tends to rely on experimental and quasi-experimental design, this chapter should follow the experimental design chapter.

For the online version of the book, there were no interface issues. The images and charts were clear and readable. The hyperlinks to sources mentioned in the text worked. The Contents menu allowed for easy and quick access to any section of the book. For the PDF version of the book, there were interface issues. The images and charts were clear and readable. However, the URLs and hyperlinks were not active in the PDF version. Furthermore, the PDF version was not bookmarked, which made it more difficult to access specific sections of the book.

I did not find grammatical errors in the book.

Overall, the cultural relevance and sensitivity were consistent with other social science research methods texts. The author does a good job of using both female and male pronouns in the prose. While there are pictures of people of color, there could be more. Most of the pictures are of white people. Also, the context is generally U.S.-centric.

Table of Contents

• Chapter 1: Introduction to research
• Chapter 2: Beginning a research project
• Chapter 3: Reading and evaluating literature
• Chapter 4: Conducting a literature review
• Chapter 5: Ethics in social work research
• Chapter 6: Linking methods with theory
• Chapter 7: Design and causality
• Chapter 8: Creating and refining a research question
• Chapter 9: Defining and measuring concepts
• Chapter 10: Sampling
• Chapter 11: Survey research
• Chapter 12: Experimental design
• Chapter 13: Interviews and focus groups
• Chapter 14: Unobtrusive research: Qualitative and quantitative approaches
• Chapter 15: Real-world research: Evaluation, single-subjects, and action research
• Chapter 16: Reporting and reading research

Ancillary Material

• Open Social Work Education

About the Book

As an introductory textbook for social work students studying research methods, this book guides students through the process of creating a research project. Students will learn how to discover a researchable topic that is interesting to them, examine scholarly literature, formulate a proper research question, design a quantitative or qualitative study to answer their question, carry out the design, interpret quantitative or qualitative results, and disseminate their findings to a variety of audiences. Examples are drawn from the author's practice and research experience, as well as topical articles from the literature.

There are ancillary materials available for this book.  

About the Contributors

Matt DeCarlo earned his PhD in social work at Virginia Commonwealth University and is an Assistant Professor of Social Work at Radford University. He earned an MSW from George Mason University in 2010 and a BA in Psychology from the College of William and Mary in 2007. His research interests include open educational resources, self-directed Medicaid supports, and basic income. Matt is an Open Textbook Network Campus Leader for Radford University. He is the founder of Open Social Work Education, a non-profit collaborative advancing OER in social work education.

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1.1 How do social workers know what to do?

Learning objectives.

• Reflect on how we know what to do as social workers
• Differentiate between micro-, meso-, and macro-level analysis
• Describe intuition, its purpose in social work, and its limitations
• Identify specific types of cognitive biases and how the influence thought
• Define scientific inquiry

What would you do?

Imagine you are a clinical social worker at a children’s mental health agency.  Today, you receive a referral from your town’s middle school about a client who often skips school, gets into fights, and is disruptive in class.  The school has suspended him and met with the parents multiple times, who say they practice strict discipline at home. Yet, the client’s behavior only gotten worse.  When you arrive at the school to meet with the boy, you notice he has difficulty maintaining eye contact with you, appears distracted, and has a few bruises on his legs.  At the same time, he is also a gifted artist, and you two spend the hour in which you assess him painting and drawing.

• Given the strengths and challenges you notice, what interventions would you select for this client and how would you know your interventions worked?

Imagine you are a social worker in an urban food desert, a geographic area in which there is no grocery store that sells fresh food.  Many of your low-income clients rely on food from the dollar store or convenience stores in order to live or simply order takeout.  You are becoming concerned about your clients’ health, as many of them are obese and say they are unable to buy fresh food.  Because convenience stores are more expensive and your clients mostly survive on minimum wage jobs or Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, they often have to rely on food pantries towards the end of the month once their money runs out.  You have spent the past month building a coalition composed of members from your community, including non-profit agencies, religious groups, and healthcare workers to lobby your city council.

• How should your group address the issue of food deserts in your community?  What intervention do you suggest?  How would you know if your intervention worked?

You are a social worker working at a public policy center focused on homelessness.  Your city is seeking a large federal grant to address the growing problem of homelessness in your city and has hired you as a consultant to work on the grant proposal.  After conducting a needs assessment in collaboration with local social service agencies and interviewing people who are homeless, you meet with city councilmembers to talk about your options to create a program.  Local agencies want to spend the money to build additional capacity at existing shelters in the community.  They also want to create a transitional housing program at an unused apartment complex where people can live after the shelter and learn independent living skills.  On the other hand, the clients you interview want to receive housing vouchers so they can rent an apartment from a landlord in the community.  They also fear the agencies running the shelter and transitional housing program would dictate how to live their lives and impose unnecessary rules, like restrictions on guests or quiet hours.  When you ask the agencies about client feedback, they state that clients could not be trusted to manage in their own apartments and need the structure and supervision provided by agency support workers.

• What kind of program should your city choose to implement?  Which program is most likely to be effective?

Assuming you’ve taken a social work course before, you will notice that the case studies cover different levels of analysis in the social ecosystem—micro, meso, and macro.  At the micro-level , social workers examine the smallest levels of interaction; even in some cases, just “the self” alone. That is our child in case 1.  When social workers investigate groups and communities, such as our food desert in case 2, their inquiry is at the meso-level . At the macro-level , social workers examine social structures and institutions. Research at the macro-level examines large-scale patterns, including culture and government policy, as in case 3. These domains interact with each other, and it is common for a social work research project to address more than one level of analysis. Moreover, research that occurs on one level is likely to have implications at the other levels of analysis.

How do social workers know what to do?

Welcome to social work research.  This chapter begins with three problems that social workers might face in practice and three questions about what a social worker should do next.  If you haven’t already, spend a minute or two thinking about how you would respond to each case and jot down some notes.  How would you respond to each of these cases?

For many of you this textbook will likely come at an early point in your social work education, so it may seem unfair to ask you what the right answers are.  And to disappoint you further, this course will not teach you the right answer to these questions.  It will, however, teach you how to answer these questions for yourself.  Social workers must learn how to examine the literature on a topic, come to a reasoned conclusion, and use that knowledge in their practice.  Similarly, social workers engage in research to make sure their interventions are helping, not harming, clients and to contribute to social science as well as social justice.

Again, assuming you did not have advanced knowledge of the topics  in the case studies, when you thought about what you might do in those practice situations, you were likely using intuition  (Cheung, 2016). Intuition is a way of knowing that is mostly unconscious.  You simply have a gut feeling about what you should do.  As you think about a problem such as those in the case studies, you notice certain details and ignore others.  Using your past experiences, you apply knowledge that seems to be relevant and make predictions about what might be true.

In this way, intuition is based on direct experience .  Many of us know things simply because we’ve experienced them directly. For example, you would know that electric fences can be pretty dangerous and painful if you touched one while standing in a puddle of water. We all probably have times we can recall when we learned something because we experienced it. If you grew up in Minnesota, you would observe plenty of kids learning each winter that it really is true that your tongue will stick to metal if it’s very cold outside. Similarly, if you passed a police officer on a two-lane highway while driving 20 miles over the speed limit, you would probably learn that that’s a good way to earn a traffic ticket.

Intuition and direct experience are powerful forces.  Uniquely, social work is a discipline that values intuition, though it will take quite a while for you to develop what social workers refer to as practice   wisdom .  Practice wisdom is the “learning by doing” that develops as one practices social work over a period of time.  Social workers also reflect on their practice, independently and with colleagues, which sharpens their intuitions and opens their mind to other viewpoints.  While your direct experience in social work may be limited at this point, feel confident that through reflective practice you will attain practice wisdom.

However, it’s important to note that intuitions are not always correct.  Think back to the first case study.  What might be your novice diagnosis for this child’s behavior?  Does he have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) because he is distractible and getting into trouble at school?  Or are those symptoms of autism spectrum disorder or an attachment disorder?  Are the bruises on his legs an indicator of ADHD, or do they indicate possible physical abuse at home?  Even if you arrived at an accurate assessment of the situation, you would still need to figure out what kind of intervention to use with the client.  If he has a mental health issue, you might say, “give him therapy.”  Well…what kind of therapy?  Should we use cognitive-behavioral therapy, play therapy, art therapy, family therapy, or animal assisted therapy?  Should we try a combination of therapy and medication prescribed by a psychiatrist?

We could guess which intervention would be best…but in practice, that would be highly unethical.  If we guessed wrong, we could be wasting time, or worse, actively harming a client.  We need to ground our social work interventions with clients and systems with something more secure than our intuition and experience.

Cognitive biases

Although the human mind is a marvel of observation and data analysis, there are universal flaws in thinking that must be overcome.  We all rely on mental shortcuts to help us make sense of a continuous stream of new information.  All people, including me and you, must train our minds to be aware of predictable flaws in thinking, termed cognitive biases .  Here is a link to the Wikipedia entry on cognitive biases .  As you can see, it is quite long.  We will review some of the most important ones here, but take a minute and browse around to get a sense of how baked-in cognitive biases are to how humans think.

The most important cognitive bias for social scientists to be aware of is confirmation bias .  Confirmation bias involves observing and analyzing information in a way that confirms what you already think is true.  No person is a blank slate.  We all arrive at each moment with a set of beliefs, experiences, and models of how the world works that we develop over time.  Often, these are grounded in our own personal experiences.  Confirmation bias assumes these intuitions are correct and ignores or manipulates new information order to avoid challenging what we already believe to be true.

Confirmation bias can be seen in many ways.  Sometimes, people will only pay attention to the information that fits their preconceived ideas and ignore information that does not fit.  This is called selective observation .  Other times, people will make hasty conclusions about a broad pattern based on only a few observations.  This is called overgeneralization .  Let’s walk through an example and see how they each would function.

In our second case study, we are trying to figure out how to help people who receive SNAP (formerly Food Stamps) who live in a food desert.  Let’s say that we have arrived at a solution and are now lobbying the city council to implement it.  There are many people who have negative beliefs about people who are “on welfare.”  These people believe individuals who receive social welfare benefits spend their money irresponsibly, are too lazy to get a job, and manipulate the system to maintain or increase their government payout. People expressing this belief may provide an example like Louis Cuff , who bought steak and lobster with his SNAP benefits and resold them for a profit.

City council members who hold these beliefs may ignore the truth about your client population—that people experiencing poverty usually spend their money responsibly and genuinely need help accessing fresh and healthy food.  This would be an example of selective observation, only looking at the cases that confirm their biased beliefs about people in poverty and ignoring evidence that challenges that perspective.  Likely, these are grounded in overgeneralization, in which one example, like Mr. Cuff, is applied broadly to the population of people using social welfare programs.  Social workers in this situation would have to hope that city council members are open to another perspective and can be swayed by evidence that challenges their beliefs.  Otherwise, they will continue to rely on a biased view of people in poverty when they create policies.

But where do these beliefs and biases come from?  Perhaps, someone who the person considers an authority told them that people in poverty are lazy and manipulative.  Naively relying on authority can take many forms.  We might rely on our parents, friends, or religious leaders as authorities on a topic.  We might consult someone who identifies as an expert in the field and simply follow what they say.  We might hop aboard a “bandwagon” and adopt the fashionable ideas and theories of our peers and friends.

Now, it is important to note that experts in the field should generally be trusted to provide well-informed answers on a topic, though that knowledge should be receptive to skeptical critique and will develop over time as more scholars study the topic.  There are limits to skepticism, however.  Disagreeing with experts about global warming, the shape of the earth, or the efficacy and safety of vaccines does not make one free of cognitive biases.  On the contrary, it is likely that the person is falling victim to the Dunning -Kruger effect , in which unskilled people overestimate their ability to find the truth.  As this comic illustrates, they are at the top of Mount Stupid.  Only through rigorous, scientific inquiry can they progress down the back slope and hope to increase their depth of knowledge about a topic.

Scientific Inquiry

Cognitive biases are most often expressed when people are using informal observation.  Until you read the question at the beginning of this chapter, you may have had little reason to formally observe and make sense of information about children’s mental health, food deserts, or homelessness policy.  Because you engaged in informal observation, it is more likely that you will express cognitive biases in your responses.  The problem with informal observation is that sometimes it is right, and sometimes it is wrong. And without any systematic process for observing or assessing the accuracy of our observations, we can never really be sure that our informal observations are accurate.  In order to minimize the effect of cognitive biases and come up with the truest understanding of a topic, we must apply a systematic framework for understanding what we observe.

The opposite of informal observation is scientific inquiry, used interchangeably with the term  research methods  in this text.  These terms refer to an organized, logical way of knowing that involves both theory and observation.  Science accounts for the limitations of cognitive biases—not perfectly, though—by ensuring observations are done rigorously, following a prescribed set of steps.  Scientists clearly describe the methods they use to conduct observations and create theories about the social world.  Theories are tested by observing the social world, and they can be shown to be false or incomplete.  In short, scientists try to learn the truth.  Social workers use scientific truths in their practice and conduct research to revise and extend our understanding of what is true in the social world.  Social workers who ignore science and act based on biased or informal observation may actively harm clients.

Key Takeaways

• Social work research occurs on the micro-, meso-, and macro-level.
• Intuition is a power, though woefully incomplete, guide to action in social work.
• All human thought is subject to cognitive biases.
• Scientific inquiry accounts for cognitive biases by applying an organized, logical way of observing and theorizing about the world.
• Authority- learning by listening to what people in authority say is true
• Cognitive biases- predictable flaws in thinking
• Confirmation bias- observing and analyzing information in a way that confirms what you already think is true
• Direct experience- learning through informal observation
• Dunning-Kruger effect- when unskilled people overestimate their ability and knowledge (and experts underestimate their ability and knowledge)
• Intuition- your “gut feeling” about what to do
• Macro-level- examining social structures and institutions
• Meso-level- examining interaction between groups
• Micro-level- examining the smallest levels of interaction, usually individuals
• Overgeneralization- using limited observations to make assumptions about broad patterns
• Practice wisdom- “learning by doing” that guides social work intervention and increases over time
• Research methods- an organized, logical way of knowing based on theory and observation

Image Attributions

Thinking woman by Free-Photos via Pixabay CC-0

Light bulb by MasterTux via Pixabay CC-0

Foundations of Social Work Research Copyright © 2020 by Rebecca L. Mauldin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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1.4: Social work research

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• Page ID 133318

• Matthew DeCarlo, Cory Cummings, & Kate Agnelli
• Open Social Work Education

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Learning Objectives

Learners will be able to...

• Differentiate between formal and informal research roles
• Describe common barriers to engaging with social work research
• Identify alternative ways of thinking about research methods

Formal and informal research roles

I’ve been teaching research methods for six years and have found that many students struggle to see the connection between research and social work practice. First of all, it’s important to mention that social work researchers exist! The authors of this textbook are social work researchers across university, government, and non-profit institutions. Matt and Cory are researchers at universities, and our research addresses higher education, disability policy, wellness & mental health, and intimate partner violence. Kate is a researcher at the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission in Virginia, where she studies policies related to criminal justice. Dalia, our editor, is a behavioral health researcher at RTI International, a nonprofit research institute, where she studies the opioid epidemic. The career path for social workers in formal research roles is bright and diverse, as we each bring a unique perspective with our ethical and theoretical orientation.

Formal research results in written products like journal articles, government reports, or policy briefs. To get a sense of formal research roles in social work, consider asking a professor about their research. You can also browse around the top journals in social work: Trauma, Violence & Abuse , Child Maltreatment ,  Child Abuse & Neglect , Social Service Review , Family Relations , Journal of Social Policy , Social Policy & Administration , Research on Social Work Practice , Health & Social Care in the Community , Health & Social  Work , British Journal of Social Work , Child & Family Social Work , International Journal of Social Welfare ,  Qualitative Social Work , Children & Youth Services Review , Social Work , Social Work in Health Care ,  Journal of Social Work Practice , International Social Work , Affilia Journal of Women and Social Work , and  Clinical Social Work Journal . Additionally, the websites to most government agencies, foundations, think tanks, and advocacy groups contain formal research often conducted by social workers.

But let’s be clear, studies show that most social work students are not interested in becoming social work researchers who publish journal articles or research reports (DeCarlo et al., 2019; Earley, 2014).\(^{17}\) Once you enter post-graduate practice, you will need to apply your formal research skills to the informal research conducted by practitioners and agencies every day. Every time you are asking who, what, when, where and why, you are conducting informal research. Informal research can be more involved. Social workers may be surprised when they are asked to engage in research projects such as needs assessments, community scans, program and policy evaluations, and single system designs, to name a few. Macro-oriented students may have to conduct research on programs and policies as part of advocacy or administration. We cannot tell you the number former students who have contacted us looking for research resources or wanting to “pick our brains” about research they are doing as part of their employment.

Research for action

Regardless of whether a social worker conducts formal research that results in journal articles or informal research that is used within an agency, all social work research is distinctive in that it is active (Engel & Schutt, 2016).\(^{18}\) We want our results to be used to effect social change. Sometimes this means using findings to change how clients receive services. Sometimes it means using findings to show the benefits of programs or policies. Sometimes it means using findings to speak with those oppressed and marginalized persons who have been left out of the policy creation process. Additionally, it can mean using research as the mode with which to engage a constituency to address a social justice issue. All of these research activities differ; however, the one consistent ingredient is that these activities move us towards social and economic justice.

Student anxieties and beliefs about research

Unfortunately, students generally arrive in research methods classes with a mixture of dread, fear, and frustration. If you attend any given social work education conference, there is probably a presentation on how to better engage students in research. There is an entire body of academic research that verifies what any research professor knows to be true. Honestly, this is why the authors of this textbook started this project. We want to make research more enjoyable and engaging for students. Generally, we have found some common perceptions get in the way of students (at least) minimally enjoying research. Let’s see if any of these match with what you are thinking.

I’m never going to use this crap!

Students who tell us that research methods is not useful to them are saying something important. As a student scholar, your most valuable asset is your time. You give your time to the subjects you consider important to you and for your career. Because most social workers don’t become researchers or practitioner-researchers, students may feel that a research methods class is a waste of time. As faculty members, we often hear from supervisors of students in field placements that research competencies “do not apply in this setting,” which further reinforces the idea that research is an activity performed only by academic researchers.

Our discussion of evidence-based practice and the ways in which social workers use research in practice brought home the idea that social workers play an important role in creating and disseminating new knowledge about social services. Furthermore, in the coming chapters, we will explore the role of research as a human right that is closely associated with the protection and establishment of other human rights. A human rights perspective also highlights the structural barriers students and practitioners face in accessing and applying scholarly knowledge in the practice arena. We hope that reframing research as something ordinary and easy to do will help address this belief that research is a useless skill.

One thing we can guarantee is that this class will be immediately useful to you. In particular, the skills you develop in finding, evaluating, and using scholarly literature will serve you throughout your graduate program and throughout your lifelong learning. In this book, you will learn how to understand and apply the scientific method to whatever topic interests you.

Research is only for super-smart people

Research methods involves a lot of terminology that may be entirely new to social work students. Other domains of social work, such as practice, are easier to apply your intuition towards. You understand how to be an empathetic person, and your experiences in life can help guide you through a practice situation or even a theoretical or conceptual question. Research may seem like a totally new area in which you have no previous experience. In research methods there can be “wrong” answers. Depending on your research question, some approaches to data analysis or measurement, for example, may not help you find the correct answer.

The fear is entirely understandable. Research is not straightforward. As Figure 1.1 shows, it is a process that is non-linear, involving multiple revisions, wrong turns, and dead ends before you figure out the best question and research approach. You may have to go back to chapters after having read them or even peek ahead at chapters your class hasn’t covered yet.

Figure 1.1 Research as a non-linear process

Moreover, research is something you learn by doing...and stumbling a few times. It’s an iterative process, or one that requires many tries to get right. There isn’t a shortcut for learning research, but if you follow along with the exercises in this book, you can break down a student research project and accomplish it piece by piece. No one just know s research. It’s something you pick up by doing it, reflecting on the experiences and results, redoing your work, and revising it in consultation with your professor and peers. Research involves exploration, risk taking, and a willingness to say, “Let’s see what we will find!”

Research is designed to suck the joy from my life

We’ve talked already about the arcane research terminology, so we won’t go into it again here. But students sometimes perceive research methods as boring. Practice knowledge and even theory are fun to learn because they are easy to apply and provide insights into the world around you. Research just seems like its own weirdly shaped and ill-fitting puzzle piece.

We completely understand where this perspective comes from and hope there are a few things you will take away from this course that aren’t boring to you. In the first section of this textbook, you will learn how to take any topic and learn what is known about it. It may seem trivial, but this is actually a superpower. Your social work education will teach you basic knowledge that can be applied to nearly all social work practice situations as well as some applied material applicable to specific social work practice situations. However, no education will provide you with everything you need to know. And certainly, no professor can tell you what will be discovered over the next few decades of your practice. Our work on literature reviews in the next few chapters will help you increase your skills and knowledge to become a strong social work student and practitioner. Following that, our exploration of research methods will help you understand how theories, practice models, and techniques you learn in other classes are created and tested scientifically. Eventually, you’ll see how all of the pieces fit together.

Get out of your own way

Together, these misconceptions and myths can create a self-fulfilling prophecy for students. If you believe research is boring, you won’t find it interesting. If you believe research is hard, you will struggle more with assignments. If you believe research is useless, you won’t see its utility. If you’re afraid that you will make mistakes, then you won’t want to try. While we certainly acknowledge that students aren’t going to love research as much as we do (we spent over a year writing this book, so we like it a lot!), we suggest reframing how you think about research using the following touchstones:

• All social workers rely on social science research to engage in competent practice.
• No one already knows research. It’s something I’ll learn through practice. And it’s challenging for everyone, not just me.
• Research is relevant to me because it allows me to figure out what is known about any topic I want to study.
• If the topic I choose to study is important to me, I will be more interested in exploring research to help me understand it further.

Students should be intentional about managing any anxiety coming from a research project. Here are some suggestions:

• Talk to your professor if you are feeling lost. We like students!
• Talk to a librarian if you are having trouble finding information about your topic.
• Seek support from your peers or mentors.

Another way to reframe your thinking is to look at Chapter 24, which discusses how to share your research project with the world. Consider the impact you want to make with your project, who you want to share it with, and what it will mean to have answered a question you want to know about the social world. Look at the variety of professional and academic conferences in which social work practitioners and researchers share their knowledge. Think about where you want to go so you know how to get started.

The structure of this textbook

The textbook is divided into five parts. In the first part (Chapters 1-5), we will review how to orient your research proposal to a specific question you want to answer and review the literature to see what we know about it. Student research projects come with special limitations, as you don’t have many resources, so our chapters are designed to help you think through those limitations and think of a project that is doable. In the second part (Chapters 6-9), we will bring in theory, causality, ethics to help you conceptualize your research project and what you hope to achieve. By the end of the second part, you will create a quantitative and qualitative research question. Parts 3 and 4 will walk you through how to conduct quantitative and qualitative research, respectively. These parts run through how to recruit people to participate in your study, what to ask them, and how to interpret the results of what they say. Finally, the last part of the textbook reviews how to connect research and practice. For some, that will mean completing program evaluations as part of agency-based practice. For others, it will mean consuming research as part of continuing education as a practitioner. We hope you enjoy reading this book as much as we enjoyed writing it!

If you are still figuring out how to navigate the book using your internet browser, please go to the  Downloads and Resources for Students page which contains a number of quick video tutorials. Also, the exercises in each chapter offer you an opportunity to apply what you wrote to your own research project, and the textbook is designed so that each exercise and each chapter build on one another, completing your proposal step-by-step. Of course, some exercises may be more relevant than others, but please consider completing these as you read

Key Takeaways

• Social workers engage in formal and informal research production as part of practice.
• If you feel anxious, bored, or overwhelmed by research, you are not alone!
• Becoming more familiar with research methods will help you become a better scholar and social work practitioner.
• With your peers, explore your feelings towards your research methods classes. Describe some themes that come up during your conversations. Identify which issues can be addressed by your professor and which can be addressed by students.
• Browse social work journals and identify an article of interest to you. Look up the author’s biography or curriculum vitae on their personal website or the website of their university.

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

4 1.4 Understanding research

Learning objectives.

• Describe common barriers to engaging with social work research
• Identify alternative ways to thinking about research methods

Sometimes students struggle to see the connection between research and social work practice. Most students enjoy a social work theory class because they can better understand the world around them. Students also like practice because it shows them how to conduct clinical work with clients—i.e., what most social work students want to do.  It can be helpful to look critically at the potential barriers to embracing the study of social work.  Most student barriers to research come from the following beliefs:

Research is useless!

Students who say that research methods is not a useful class to them are saying something important. As a scholar (or student), your most valuable asset is your time. You give your time to the subjects you consider important to you and your future practice. Because most social workers don’t become researchers or practitioner-researchers, students feel like a research methods class is a waste of time.

Our discussion of evidence-based practice and the ways in which social workers use research methods in practice brought home the idea that social workers play an important role in creating new knowledge about social services. On a more immediate level, research methods will also help you become a stronger social work student. Upcoming chapters of this textbook will review how to search for literature on a topic and write a literature review. These skills are relevant in every classroom during your academic career. The rest of the textbook will help you understand the mechanics of research methods so you can better understand the content of those pesky journal articles your professors force you to cite in your papers.

Research is too hard!

Research methods involves a lot of terminology that is entirely new to social workers. Other domains of social work, such as practice, are easier to apply your intuition towards. You understand how to be an empathetic person, and your experiences in life can help guide you through a practice situation or even theoretical or conceptual question. Research may seem like a totally new area in which you have no previous experience. It can seem like a lot to learn. In addition to the normal memorization and application of terms, research methods also has wrong answers. There are certain combinations of methods that just don’t work together.

The fear is entirely understandable. Research is not straightforward. As Figure 1.1 shows, it is a process that is non-linear, involving multiple revisions, wrong turns, and dead ends before you figure out the best question and research approach. You may have to go back to chapters after having read them or even peek ahead at chapters your class hasn’t covered yet.

Moreover, research is something you learn by doing…and stumbling a few times. It’s an iterative process, or one that requires lots of tries to get right. There isn’t a shortcut for learning research, but hopefully your research methods class is one in which your research project is broken down into smaller parts and you get consistent feedback throughout the process. No one just knows research. It’s something you pick up by doing it, reflecting on the experiences and results, redoing your work, and revising it in consultation with your professor.

Research is boring!

Research methods is sometimes seen as a boring topic by many students. Practice knowledge and even theory are fun to learn because they are easy to apply and give you insight into the world around you. Research just seems like its own weird, remote thing.

Your social work education will present some generalist material, which is applicable to nearly all social work practice situations, and some applied material, which is applicable to specific social work practice situations. However, no education will provide you with everything you need to know. And certainly, no education will tell you what will be discovered over the next few decades of your practice. Our exploration of research methods will help you further understand how the theories, practice models, and techniques you learn in your other classes are created and tested scientifically.  The material you learn in research class will allow you to think critically about material throughout your entire program and into your social work career.

Get out of your own way

Together, the beliefs of “research is useless, boring, and hard” can create a self-fulfilling prophecy for students. If you believe research is boring, you won’t find it interesting. If you believe research is hard, you will struggle more with assignments. If you believe research is useless, you won’t see its utility. Let’s provide some reframing of how you might think about research using these touchstones:

• All social workers rely on social science research to engage in competent practice.
• No one already knows research. It’s something I’ll learn through practice. And it’s challenging for everyone.
• Research is relevant to me because it allows me to figure out what is known about any topic I want to study.
• If the topic I choose to study is important to me, I will be more interested in research.

Structure of this textbook

While you may not have chosen this course, by reframing your approach to it, you increase the likelihood of getting a lot out of it. To that end, here is the structure of this book:

In Chapters 2-5, you’ll learn about how research informs and tests theory. We’ll discuss how to conduct research in an ethical manner, create research questions, and measure concepts in the social world.

Chapters 6-10 will describe how to conduct research, whether it’s a quantitative survey or experiment, or alternately, a qualitative interview or focus group. We’ll also review how to analyze data that someone else has already collected.

Finally, Chapters 11 and 12 will review the types of research most commonly used in social work practice, including evaluation research and action research, and how to report the results of your research to various audiences.

Key Takeaways

• Anxiety about research methods is a common experience for students.
• Research methods will help you become a better scholar and practitioner.

Image Attributions

Untitled image by Ohio State University Libraries  CC-BY 4.0

Foundations of Social Work Research Copyright © 2020 by Rebecca L. Mauldin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Social Work Research: Concept, Scope

Last Updated on December 30, 2022 by Team TSW

An effort to create new knowledge or to upgrade existing knowledge either through observation, available facts, evidences or any other method, is research. We often make our mind or take decision, based on our observation about certain objects or phenomena. During whole process we remain unaware of our biases, we do not question them and we attribute our observations entirely to the object being observed. Though it is still possible to arrive at right decision on the basis of wrong reasons or vice versa. This whole thing questions the process of observation. Was the observation error-free? While observing are we aware of our limitations? Every method of observation has certain limitations. Important thing here is to take biases, the errors and limitations into consideration. Social work research is the application of research methods in the field of social work.

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Purpose of social work research is to produce new knowledge or to increase already available knowledge in the field of social work. Social work research gives new dimensions to social work techniques and methods and provides new ways to deal with problems. Social work research attempts to highlight insights about what intervention or treatment is actually helpful in practice and bring the best result. It also throw light on what hinder the attainment of desired goal. It also look for answers to problems faced by practitioners.

Relevance of Research in Social Work

Social work research tries to find answers to questions faced by practitioners and to make existing intervention more effective. The problems are not only professional but personal too. Overall aim is to make existing social work methods and techniques better and more effective.

In social work research, we study the problems from the point of view of professional social work. The designing of research problems, data collection and its interpretation will have to be attempted in a manner as would be useful to professional social work. The process should add new knowledge to social work theory and practice and also to enhance the outcome of professional social workers.

Limitation of Scientific Research Method in Social Work

Social work primarily deals with human behaviour, which is by and large complex and dynamic in nature. This means that different humans tend to behave differently under the same circumstances. One person can be happy in given circumstances and the second may be sad and at the same time others may remain indifferent. So it can easily be deduced that data collected for humans is subjective in nature and means very little for scientific research. Therefore one can not investigate human behaviour under guided conditions as in natural science. This creates many problems for researchers. 

Social work will never realize the objective of research as completely as natural science does, but still social work does not completely diminish the importance of scientific research methods.

Social Work is a diverse profession and work almost at all level of social system. Possible broad research areas could be:-

• Community health.
• Community mental health.
• Child welfare.
• Women welfare.
• Youth welfare.
• Juvenile delinquency. 
• Crime and correction.
• Aged welfare.
• Poverty alleviation.
• Management of Social Welfare Department and Organization.
• Disaster Management.
• Industrial Social Work. 

These are the areas which are very frequently studied by Social workers. Researchers might focus on individuals, families, groups, community or broad social systems.

Facts, events, and evidence help acquire reliable knowledge about various aspects of human behaviour. To get that knowledge, the method of science is still the most commonly used method. Objectivity, replication, prediction and verifiability are the characteristics of scientific approach, which keeps the researchers at bay from their personal biases, beliefs, perceptions, values, attitudes and emotions. With all the limitations and characteristics, scientific research is the best method to arrive at generalization in the field of social work.

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Julie A. Kalina-Hammond, LISW-S

Julie A. Kalina-Hammond, LISW- S is a licensed independent social worker serving as a Research Associate at the Begun Center's Center for Evidence-Based Practices in the role of Clinical Trainer and Fidelity Specialist.

Julie served as the Director of Forensic Services at an Integrated Health Center and has been in her field of practice for twenty-four years. This position included serving as the Treatment Manager for Mental Health Court, which included oversight of an interdisciplinary team. In addition, Julie developed and provided oversight to mental health services and drug and alcohol services within a county adult detention facility, including implementing services for inmates experiencing withdrawal. She was also a CIT Coordinator and manager of a First Responder Wellness Program. She is one of the founders of Community Alliance of Law Enforcement and Mental Health Systems (CALMHS) Committee. She is a Certified Forensic Social Worker and Certified First Responder Counselor. Prior to her work in social work, Julie was a probation officer. She has also taught undergraduate and graduate level social work classes. 

Julie received the 2014 Woman of Achievement award from Lakeland Community College’s Women’s Center in. In 2007 she received the Ohio Forensic Leadership Award. In 2003 she received the NAMI Lake County Coordinator’s Leadership Award. Julie has a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Criminal Justice from The Ohio State University and a Master of Social Science Administration from Case Western Reserve University. Her interests are working with persons with mental illness involved in the Criminal Justice System, working with First Responders and general social work practice.

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Dod grants $1.1 million to michigan state university’s school of social work to improve psychosocial support for mesothelioma caregivers.

June 3, 2024 - Brandon Drain

The Department of Defense (DOD) granted Michigan State University’s School of Social Work and the Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation a grant of $1,125,417 to improve psychosocial support for mesothelioma caregivers.

Mesothelioma is an aggressive cancer with a poor prognosis that is difficult to diagnose and to treat. The median survival for patients is eight months, and about 40% of patients receive no treatment, according to experts.

Mesothelioma is typically caused by the inhalation of asbestos and is often linked to occupational exposure, with significant levels of exposure found in the military population. It may be diagnosed 30 to 50 years after exposure.

In addition, mesothelioma patients “struggle with anger and conflicting feelings of loyalty and blame toward longtime employers,” according to Woodward. They also face legal and financial circumstances related to mesothelioma that add complications for the caregivers after their loved one’s death. “All of these things make caregiving especially complicated for mesothelioma caregivers; however, there’s not a lot of research looking specifically at this group.”

The research team, which includes MSU Social Work doctoral students Jen Hirsch and Linda Zhang, wants to address this gap by improving understanding of mesothelioma caregivers’ experience from the time their loved one is diagnosed, through the patient’s death and beyond. In addition, they will create a 10-week-long intervention group led by social workers with experience in oncology and mesothelioma specifically.

“Sessions will include a combination of information sharing, homework and participant reflection, and will draw on the concept of meaning-making, which has been found to be an important aspect of adaptation in bereavement,” said Woodward. The final intervention will be dictated by the results of semi-structured interviews and focus groups with patients, current caregivers, those who have lost a loved one to mesothelioma and other stakeholders, according to Woodward.

“From a research perspective, one benefit is to add to knowledge about mesothelioma caregivers, which is largely missing and therefore makes it hard for health and social service professionals to effectively support them," said Woodward. “Of course, we also hope that the intervention proves to be feasible, ultimately effective at supporting caregivers and something that can be used more broadly.”

This study is slated to proceed over the course of four years, progressing from information gathering to intervention development and then feasibility testing. This study is also directly relevant to the overall intention of the DOD’s Patient Well-Being and Survivorship Award to fill gaps in our understanding of “the psychological health and well-being of those affected by cancer,” with a focus specifically on mesothelioma caregivers.

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Which social media platforms are most common, who uses each social media platform, find out more, social media fact sheet.

Many Americans use social media to connect with one another, engage with news content, share information and entertain themselves. Explore the patterns and trends shaping the social media landscape.

To better understand Americans’ social media use, Pew Research Center surveyed 5,733 U.S. adults from May 19 to Sept. 5, 2023. Ipsos conducted this National Public Opinion Reference Survey (NPORS) for the Center using address-based sampling and a multimode protocol that included both web and mail. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race and ethnicity, education and other categories.

Polls from 2000 to 2021 were conducted via phone. For more on this mode shift, read our Q&A.

Here are the questions used for this analysis , along with responses, and  its methodology ­­­.

A note on terminology: Our May-September 2023 survey was already in the field when Twitter changed its name to “X.” The terms  Twitter  and  X  are both used in this report to refer to the same platform.

YouTube and Facebook are the most-widely used online platforms. About half of U.S. adults say they use Instagram, and smaller shares use sites or apps such as TikTok, LinkedIn, Twitter (X) and BeReal.

Note: The vertical line indicates a change in mode. Polls from 2012-2021 were conducted via phone. In 2023, the poll was conducted via web and mail. For more details on this shift, please read our Q&A . Refer to the topline for more information on how question wording varied over the years. Pre-2018 data is not available for YouTube, Snapchat or WhatsApp; pre-2019 data is not available for Reddit; pre-2021 data is not available for TikTok; pre-2023 data is not available for BeReal. Respondents who did not give an answer are not shown.

Source: Surveys of U.S. adults conducted 2012-2023.

Usage of the major online platforms varies by factors such as age, gender and level of formal education.

% of U.S. adults who say they ever use __ by …

• RACE & ETHNICITY
• POLITICAL AFFILIATION

This fact sheet was compiled by Research Assistant  Olivia Sidoti , with help from Research Analyst  Risa Gelles-Watnick , Research Analyst  Michelle Faverio , Digital Producer  Sara Atske , Associate Information Graphics Designer Kaitlyn Radde and Temporary Researcher  Eugenie Park .

Follow these links for more in-depth analysis of the impact of social media on American life.

• Americans’ Social Media Use  Jan. 31, 2024
• Americans’ Use of Mobile Technology and Home Broadband  Jan. 31 2024
• Q&A: How and why we’re changing the way we study tech adoption  Jan. 31, 2024

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