Tehila RefaeliBen-Gurion University of the Negev | bgu · Department of Social Work
Tehila Refaeli
Phd.
About
40
Publications
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Introduction
My research in the last years has focused on young people (18-29) from marginalized groups and in risky situations during their transition to adulthood, and explores the challenges, barriers and facilitators to integration into the society among these groups. For example, my studies focus on young people who aged out of residential care facilities, young women in the periphery of Israel and those in poverty. This field of study is developing all over the world, but still receives little recognition in research in Israel. I use both qualitative and quantitative data in my studies and many of them include mixed methods.
Publications
Publications (40)
Post-secondary education (PSE) is an important factor predicting a person's success in life. One group that would benefit from obtaining PSE are young women from ethnic minority groups. The current study focuses on young Bedouin women, one of the most marginalized minority groups in Israel, with the aim of exposing the barriers they face on their w...
Gaining employment and reaching a stable and self‐sufficient livelihood are essential life tasks, especially for young people ageing out of public care. This longitudinal study followed alumni of welfare and educational residential care settings in Israel for 10 years after leaving care. Here, we describe care leavers' employment and economic self‐...
Background
Care leavers, young people who have aged out of residential or foster care, experience many challenges during their transition to adulthood. However, there is relatively little research on care leavers' intimate relationships. Their parenthood has been explored to a greater extent, but mostly qualitatively.
Objective
This study focused...
Although research from a positive psychology perspective is conducted among different populations, few studies have examined the predictors of life satisfaction among young backpackers. The current study focused on young adults (ages 21–30), an age group for whom backpacking treks are a growing phenomenon, during their treks in the Far East and Sou...
Based on Pearlin’s stress process model and the social inequality approach to health, this study used a social lens to explore the role of socioeconomic inequities in mental distress during the COVID-19 pandemic in Israel. Specifically, we examined people’s pre-pandemic sociodemographic characteristics and economic situation, and the economic effec...
The mechanisms underlying the SES-psychological distress association are not fully explored. Based on representative cross-sectional data from Israel for the year 2017 (N = 1508), we examine (1) the association between subjective poverty, material deprivation, social capital, and psychological distress among young adults (20–29 years); and (2) whet...
The COVID-19 (2019 novel coronavirus) pandemic, which has been accompanied by an economic crisis and multiple restrictions on our lives, has sparked renewed interest in the topic of loneliness as well as its determinants. We examined (1) the association between financial strain, occurring upon the outbreak of the virus, and loneliness among Israeli...
Young adults are a high-risk group for experiencing loneliness. We examine (1) the prevalence of loneliness among young adults in three ethnocultural groups in Israel: native Jews, former Soviet Union immigrants and Arabs; (2) the associations between loneliness and ethnicity, perceived poverty, physical and mental health, perceived discrimination,...
The current study focused on risk-taking behaviour among young adults who spent a long period of time outside their home country as backpackers, a growing phenomenon among this age group. Using concepts from Jessor’s problem-behaviour theory (1991), we examined different risk and protective factors as predictors of risk-taking behaviours among youn...
During emerging adulthood, individuals are primarily concerned with themselves. Community participation, however, may help one to mature, and community belonging is important for well‐being. As such, the current study aimed to examine these two components among young‐adult Israeli backpackers abroad. We examined the role of personal (mastery, self‐...
Preliminary evidence indicates that Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) affects people differently along social axes, among which socioeconomic status is key. This study used mixed methods to add data from Israel to this developing body of knowledge. Using closed questions, the study compared 126 people living in poverty with 147 people not living...
Young people who are taken up into the care system (including foster, formal kinship and residential or group care) traditionally have to leave care at age 18, the generally accepted age of adulthood. Research globally has shown that most youth are not ready to transition to independent living at 18 and require additional support into early adultho...
In the wake of COVID-19, unemployment and its potential deleterious consequences have
attracted renewed interest. We examined (1) the association between unemployment, occurring upon the coronavirus outbreak, and psychological distress among Israeli young people (20–35-years-old); (2) the associations between various psychological resources/risk fa...
Loneliness is a severe risk factor that has been linked to diminished health outcomes and low quality of life across ages. Young adults have been identified as a high-risk group for experiencing loneliness, but only a few studies have explored the economic and social determinants of loneliness in this age group. Taking a social inequality approach...
This study examined the rate of secondary traumatic stress (STS) among social work students and the contribution of background variables, personal resources (mastery and self-differentiation) and environmental resources (supervision satisfaction and peer support) to STS. The sample consisted of 259 social work students at three social work schools...
The transition to adulthood for young people leaving care has become a significant subject of research over recent decades, especially given consistent findings that suggest that alumni of care are at high risk of adverse outcomes. However, there is no definitive consensus on how findings from research can best inform practice with youth in transit...
Purpose
Supervision is an essential part of social work education. Accordingly, supervision satisfaction plays an important role in the development of the students’ professional identity. However, the factors contributing to supervision satisfaction among social work students have rarely been examined. This study examined the contribution of superv...
This study examined the contribution of background variables, personal factors (professional commitment) and environmental factors (peer support and supervision) to social work students' vicarious growth as an implication of their field practicums with trauma victims. Special emphasis was placed on examining the role of secondary traumatisation in...
A positive sense of agency is crucial for a successful transition to adulthood. Young women at risk may struggle with a compromised sense of agency due to their backgrounds and daily challenges, potentially delaying them at the stage of emerging adulthood when they are required to become independent. The current paper looks at the development of ag...
This study focuses on marginalized young women, participating in programs designed to meet their personal, vocational and social needs. The study's aims were to include gender-related aspects in the exploration of the prevalence of risk situations and to test a predicting model for risk situations based on the young women's demographic characterist...
Data are scarce on the long‐term needs of care‐leavers and on the support resources that are available for them in the years after leaving care. This mixed‐methods study presents data on the needs and availability of support of 222 Israeli care‐leavers, suggesting that the most urgent needs of care‐leavers are a lasting need for a stable and availa...
Most studies on young people aging-out of residential care (care leavers) have examined their situation in various post-care life domains (e.g. education, employment), but their subjective well-being, particularly life satisfaction, has been neglected. Here we focus on life satisfaction among care leavers four years after leaving care in Israel. Mi...
This longitudinal study tests a model that predicts aspirations toward higher education (AtHE) among alumni of public care in Israel based on their personal resources (self-esteem, readiness for independent living, and perceptions of their future), the support they receive from their mothers and peers, and their perception of the impact of military...
This study focuses on a program designed to engage at-risk youth in the National Civic Service (NCS) in Israel with the goal of enabling them to better integrate into normative adult lives. This exploratory study employed a cross-sectional design and compared groups of at-risk female volunteers (N = 426) with comparison groups of not at-risk partic...
School violence is a global concern that calls for international research using cross context methods. Although there are several international surveys that compare school violence across countries, they do not clearly address issues of similarities and differences in relative prevalence of different types of victimization and their relations with...
Studies have revealed that young people who age out of residential or foster care (care leavers) must cope with a variety of challenges as they transition to adulthood. In addition, there are wide gaps in achievements in different life domains between care leavers and other people in their age group. Using a narrative approach, the study presented...
This article describes the perspectives of alumni of National Civic Service (NCS) in Israel on its impact at the individual level. We compared 250 young women who were identified as youth at risk with 295 mainstream volunteers. Overall, the two groups show similar outcomes that are typical to this developmental stage of life. Yet youth at risk expe...
In the present study, ecological theory was used as a basis for predicting depression among women who survive intimate partner violence (IPV). The predictors examined in the study derived from three ecological systems: the microsystem (background variables and frequency of the violence), the ontogenic system (personal resources), and the mesosystem...
In the last decade accumulating evidence across many countries points to the poor educational outcomes of youth formerly placed in care and their under-representation in higher education. Academic expectations in late adolescence are considered a key marker for educational attainments in young adulthood. Although these expectations were studied ext...
This paper focuses on care leavers’ experiences of their transition from care to adulthood. Using a social pedagogical perspective,
we explore continuity and discontinuity in their life course as central aspects of support in the transition process. Using biographical narratives of three young
people with different paths of transition from public c...
The aim of this chapter is to explore what constitutes an ethical approach to researching youths leaving care by identifying core ethical principles, and examining the challenges of maintaining an ethical culture in the fieldwork. The discussions are supported with case studies from four countries: China, Germany, Israel and Switzerland. The discus...
The study goals were to describe self-efficacy for higher education among care leavers and Identify predictors of self-efficacy for higher education including:
background, placement, education, personal resources, support sources and current situation.
A growing body of literature has documented the dismal outcomes of youth placed in juvenile correctional facilities (JCFs) upon their return to the community. However, very little is known as to how well equipped are the youth with the necessary skills for reintegration. In the current study, the authors examine self-reports of readiness for indepe...
DISCUSSION In the presented case studies, within the life stories there were crucial moments. These moments represent a significant change in the expected life course-positive turning points (Gilligan, 2009). The events did not take place in an isolated moment-but instead had clear antecedents and also clear follow-ups: 1. A significant event is ha...
Children who grew up in care institutions encounter many difficulties in the years after leaving care, including challenges related to their low education achievements while they were still in care. Higher education is therefore hard and sometimes almost impossible to achieve. The current article uses data from a research project which focuses on t...
Youth leaving state care are a vulnerable group. It is important to examine their status and needs before they leave care, so that policies and practices are designed to address their needs. The aim of this study is to assess readiness for independent living of youth on the verge of leaving residential care in Israel, and to identify the life domai...
In Israel, the ‘Civic-National Volunteer Service for Youth At-risk’ was developed to help support their transition to adulthood, while making a contribution to society. The present paper examines life satisfaction and perceptions of the future among youth at-risk completing their volunteer service. Further, the paper explores how socio-demographic...
Questions
Questions (2)
Projects
Projects (4)
The study will explore how to promote the integration of marginalized young women into the post-secondary education (PSE) system by exploring the relevant barriers to and facilitating factors of the enrolment of marginalized women in PSE. The study population will comprise young women (aged 18-25) from two marginalized sub-groups in Israel: young Bedouin women from southern Israel and young women who live in the Negev periphery. Both groups of women are subjected to poverty, distress, and discrimination.
The research questions are:
●What structural, social and personal barriers might these young women face that could prevent or delay their integration into the PSE system?
●What structural, social and personal facilitating factors might help them cope with these barriers?
Each question will be examined separately for each sub-group to highlight their cultural differences.
This study extends our longitudinal study to another important juncture in the lives of care leavers by following the same group of young people for the fourth time, when they are 28-29 years old.
The study uses longitudinal design and mixed methods (a) to examine care leavers’ outcomes when they approach young adulthood; (b) to predict these outcomes based on their characteristics while in care and over time; (c) to identify distinct trajectories of outcomes over time, and (d) to identify possible background characteristics and in-care experiences associated with distinct trajectories.
