Jane Littlewood’s research while affiliated with Loughborough University and other places

Social work practice is, at any one time, a reflection of a particular set of assumptions about the causation of personal and social problems and the most effective responses to these. It relates to theories of the way society operates and tests those theories by acting on them (Kingsley, 1985). In Chapter 2, we explored theoretical perspectives on the ways in which subjective understandings of the world are shaped through experience and social context. Research has often felt irrelevant to the social work world because it has not allowed for subjectivity.

Practitioners are engaged in the process of data analysis all of the time. They interpret and assign meaning to all kinds of data from a wide range of sources: what they read, what they see, what they hear, what they are told, what they themselves think and feel. In this chapter we explore ways in which practitioners may become more aware, more explicit and more rigorous about these processes.

Problem-definition and assessment is not a simple objective measure but a complex process which involves values, principles, agency policies and procedures, the current legal position and the perspectives of social workers and their managers. Similar situations may or may not lead a client to seek help, a social worker to open a case file, a court to make an order. (Hardiker, Exton and Barker, 1989: 112)

Research is a publicly accountable activity. As such it contrasts with ‘intuition’, with taken-for-granted assumptions that remain private and implicit, and with ‘common sense’. Practitioners who are research-minded seriously appraise their understandings of the world. They consider how these are shaped through personal experience in specific historical, social and economic contexts. They reflect on the way these understandings relate to their practice. This requires that practitioners are clear and open about the theories they bring into play.

In this book we address the relationship between research and social work by exploring the possibilities of integrating research with practice. This is not a research methods text. Our intention is not to provide advice and guidance to enable social workers to undertake research or even to implement the findings from research into their practice. Rather our aim is to learn from research methodology and methods so as to contribute to the development of social work methodology and methods: to develop a social work practice informed by and infused with understanding of research methodology and methods: to provide a methodology for the research-minded practitioner; to develop a critical, reflective practice.

We set out in this book to explore some ways in which certain types of research methodologies may be retrieved to inform social work methodologies. We passionately believed that the practice-versus-research traditions in social work could be dismantled through the development of new kinds of critical, reflective practice. By this we mean particular ways of thinking about social work theory and practice, such as: the questioning of taken-for-granted assumptions about the definition of problems and the categorisation of need; recognising the ways in which ideas, thoughts, understandings and opinions are shaped historically, economically, politically and socially through social structures and processes; making the implicit explicit; raising the profile of value positions and working with the problematics they generate; locating practice in its agency contexts so that service delivery issues are not addressed as routine constraints; building reflection, involvement and evaluation into every stage of the practice process.

Unlike aspects of practice covered in preceding chapters — problem formulation, engagement with subjects, analysis — evaluation is invariably informed by research methodologies. Research and evaluation go together. In this chapter we develop a model which moves responsibility for evaluation from the external ‘expert’ or the top-down manager to the practitioner and her team.

Research and Practice - Epistemology and Theory in Social Work - Purposes and Values of Research - A Methodology for the Research-Minded Practitioners - Formulating the Issues in Research-Minded Practice - Engaging with Subjects to Generate Data - Analysing the Data of Practice - The Practitioner-Evaluator - Conclusion

This chapter serves as a bridge between the first three chapters, which have been concerned with broad general themes and theoretical issues in research and practice, and the following chapters which focus on stages of the practice process: formulating the issues and preparation, groundwork and access; engaging with subjects to generate data; analysing practice data; and evaluating practice. Our intention now is to begin to develop a methodology for research-minded practice. We consider in this chapter particular aspects of research methodology, particularly those of participatory research, that may usefully inform the practice methodology of the researchminded practitioner.

I am looking for something. Much of it is hidden and hard to find. Much of it is complex and slippery; once found it is hard to hold. I am looking for that elusive quality called experience. But how am I to find it? (O’Hagan, 1986: 2)