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This paper uses Carol Bacchi's 'What's the problem represented to be?' (WPR) framework to explore representations of women's mental health in federal and South Australian mental health policies. It argues that mental health policies govern women through neoliberal discourses that individualise mental health and illness while neglecting the social structural factors which significantly influence mental health outcomes and health equity. In a 'self-monitoring' neoliberal society, people are increasingly required to seek medical and pharmaceutical intervention to promote ideal personhoods, with women overrepresented in this group. The disciplinary power of the medicalisation discourse categorises women as either ideal or failed neoliberal subjects. This is concerning for social workers because neoliberal and medicalisation discourses shape how women's mental health is represented in policy and responded to in practice. This paper challenges biomedical and neoliberal discourses underpinning policy representations and identifies the implications for social work and social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article announces the invitation for researchers to submit to the special issue on the contributions of qualitative methods to social work intervention research. It aims to showcase the special contributions that qualitative methods do in contributing to intervention research. It stresses that the articles should be able to reflect the aims and objectives of the journal which are outlined in the information for contributors section within the journal.

At a time when both extensive international and national protest and criticisms are directed toward the Norwegian Child Welfare Services, it is of great interest to researchers to gain insight into the viewpoints presented in protest groups on social media. The paper aims to give insight into the ethical judgement involved in research on digital communities where it is difficult to decide whether certain material is public or not. In addition, the paper reflects on the social consequences of understanding some participants as vulnerable versus understanding them as citizens, in a social work/child protection context on social media. A considerable amount of literature focuses on ethical questions in Internet research. There is also literature on the ethical considerations connected to resistance and protest groups on social media. There is, however, less existing research about the ethical decision-making within the field of social work, child protection and client protests on the Internet. This paper analyses certain experiences from a qualitative research project regarding Facebook groups protesting Child Welfare Services in Norway. The paper concludes that in some social media research contexts, as the one presented here, taking extra care to anonymize participants in publications is sufficient to secure privacy, and covert collection of data is possible without jeopardizing ethical guidelines. Further, by developing practical ethical judgement, we can – in some social work contexts – avoid putting people into categories like "vulnerable" and instead approach the participants in public Facebook groups as citizens with socio-political opinions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the creation of organisations via people processing (Prottas 1979), taking as its case study a new and developing family centre that aims to offer various social and health services under the same roof. The study draws on ethnomethodology, meaning that organisations are herein understood as being created and continuously produced in and through interaction. The data consist of 11 audio-recorded meetings from the centre's steering group, which includes managers from different service fields and welfare agencies. In analysing the creation of the centre through people processing, this paper scrutinises how the meeting participants orient themselves toward and produce the centre's client categories, what characteristics they connect to these categories, and how they do boundary work regarding which categories belong or not to the centre's target groups. The meeting participants produce three different family based client categories. The first category is ordinary families, those without any special problems who just pop into the centre to see other people. These families are distinguished from the second category, best matching families, who are defined as having problems that would benefit from the integrated, multi-professional work conducted at the centre. The third category, families with too specific needs, refers to client groups whose service needs are at least partly beyond the centre's expertise and resources. The centre needs these people-processing activities to make sense of its mission, clients and co-partners; this ongoing reasoning process allows the emerging centre to exist and find its place in the local service system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The North American Muslim population is growing rapidly, but little research has been conducted to help social workers interact with members of this population in a culturally sensitive manner. To assist social workers engage with Muslims in an ethical and effective manner, this qualitative study sought to answer the following questions: how do Muslims experience interactions with non-Muslims and what have they learned from their encounters that might facilitate positive interactions? To answer these two questions, we used narrative inquiry with a sample of 10 Muslim social work students and recent alumni. The findings suggest that Muslims may be treated either positively or negatively by non-Muslims in interactions in various contexts, that they are frequently unable to voice their religious perspectives, and that their religious difference is often portrayed in single-sided or negative ways as well as prioritized against their wishes while ignoring other aspects of their social identities. As a result, many tend to avoid interactions with non-Muslims. The paper offers strategies to foster more respectful interactions with Muslims, such as attending to how much their religious difference is prioritized, and providing opportunities to share their perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the use of participant validation in qualitative research, and illustrates that the process of validation can be something more than validation. It can also generate new data and provide the participants with empowering experiences. The paper is based on an action research project involving birth parents in the development of new types of services for parents who involuntary have had a child placed in care. In addition to discussing the challenges of participant validation, this paper also highlights the methodological, ethical, and empowering effects of this type of validation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Now more than ever, qualitative social work researchers are being called upon to conduct increasingly complex, multifaceted, and intersectional research. Given the heightened complexity of social work research, it is necessary that scholars learn strategies to streamline the research process and digital tools for qualitative research are a mechanism to do so. In this paper, I share insights gleaned from personal experience working with Qualitative Data Analysis Software, specifically MAXQDA 12, to support a larger study that explored the social lives of older gay men. This paper highlights the various functions of MAXQDA 12 and how qualitative social work researchers can use the program to improve the research process and outcomes. Despite the rapid growth in production of digital tools for qualitative research there remains a dearth in studies that explicitly address how digital tools are used in the extant literature on qualitative research. This paper sheds light on this noted gap in the literature by exploring the functionality of MAXQDA 12 and how it can be applied to improve qualitative social work research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There exist ongoing calls among social work scholars and practitioners to cultivate applied knowledge of critical and emancipatory practice. In this paper, I explore the utility of text-based vignettes as instruments that can be used to elicit insight from marginalized service users on critical social work practice. To do this work, I draw on data from interviews with 20 transgender and gender diverse (TGD) social service users, along with 10 social workers, whose responses to a text-based vignette were originally used to build an understanding of the constituents of equitable social work practice with TGD people. Incorporating critical pragmatism as a conceptual framework and constructivist grounded theory as a methodological orientation, I analyze data from this study as an exemplar that substantiates the promise of using text-based vignettes in qualitative social work research to generate knowledge of critical social work practice. Specifically, I demonstrate how text-based vignettes in this study (1) contextualized the meaning, significance, and impact of oppression for service users, (2) built insight on practice that reflects solidarity and allyship, and (3) identified opportunities for social workers' reflexive use of professional power to effect change. Accounting for the tensions between empiricism and critical praxis in social work, I consider the promise of incorporating text-based vignettes to develop empirical social work literature that is rooted in the voices of marginalized service users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concerns parenting assessments which are integral to child-safeguarding professional processes in England, and which involve Deaf parents whose primary language is British Sign Language (BSL). In an under-researched area of social work, the research aim was to contribute to the existing literature by eliciting the practice wisdom of specialist professionals. Specifically, it draws upon their linguistic and cultural knowledge of the Deaf community when they are involved in parenting assessments with Deaf parents who are subject to safeguarding concerns. Data about these professionals' actual experiences of navigating Deaf cultural-competency in contemporary child protection practices were collected through seven video-recorded, semi-structured interviews conducted in BSL. Using interpretive phenomenological analysis, data were analysed in their source language (BSL). This article focusses on one key theme, termed 'Professional Recognition', which incorporates a) the identification of specialist roles and b) the impact of referral processes and protocols on assessment outcomes. The findings highlight participants' perspectives on the benefits and disadvantages of their specialist role in this context. Although their brokerage skills, cultural competence, linguistic fluency and specialist knowledge of the Deaf community are highly regarded and valued by some colleagues, there is insufficient recognition of their existence by the majority. Secondly, participants are concerned by the inefficiency and inconsistency of the referral processes and protocols which they consider have adverse effects on assessment outcomes, and consequently the parents involved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on qualitative findings on how young people in long-term foster care in Ireland interpret permanence and stability. We focus principally on subjective and relational permanence, emphasising the significance of these concepts for social work, while extending some conceptual approaches to permanence. Importantly, findings from this study highlight conceptual gaps in how permanence and stability are conceptualised in research and we outline an approach which more fully embraces the multi-dimensionality of young people's life experiences and emotions. Recent studies underline that permanence encompasses several elements (e.g. ecological, legal). However, this paper extends current research in illustrating how Irish young people in foster care experience permanence and stability every day, and how these experiences embrace discursive, emotional and temporal dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parents of children in out-of-home care receive little support from social services. Drawing on qualitative data collected in the project 'Parent at a distance', in which social services in seven municipalities in Sweden aimed to improve support to parents whose children are placed in foster care, this paper explores social workers' discourses about parents to children in care. The analysis is based on focus group data in which a total of 52 social workers reflected on parents to children in care and how they can be supported by social services. The concept of interpretive repertoires was used to analyse how social workers in interaction construct parents and their support needs. The identified repertoires of change, acceptance, permanency, biology and non-biology may contribute to the understanding of why so few parents receive support, even though legislation stipulates that placements should be temporary. The paper concluded that discourses may shape support practices and thus it is crucial that social workers reflect on and develop their awareness about their constructions of parents and their role for children in out-of-home care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is evidence that engagement with the arts can engender transformative effects on young people's views of themselves and their futures, this can be particularly useful for children and young people in care. This paper draws on a case study of an arts-based programme delivered in Wales, UK. Field observations of the arts-based sessions were conducted, and the participant sample included young people in foster care (n = 8), foster carers (n = 7) and project facilitators (n = 3). The study employed interviews, observations, reflexive diaries, and metaphor work to explore the subjective accounts of these different stakeholders. This provided an insight into their experience of being involved with the arts-based programme, the impacts of this involvement, and what steps they felt could be taken to improve the model. The paper argues that arts and cultural engagement can be transformative in improving the confidence and social connectedness of young people in foster care, but that attention needs to be given to how programmes are delivered. The paper documents the often overlooked mundane, yet important, aspects of planning arts-based programmes, exploring the involvement of foster carers, interpersonal relationships, and the provision of refreshments. It calls for investment in developing carefully designed extracurricular opportunities for young people in care, where they can experience 'becoming more confident in being themselves'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented where the editor discusses various reports in the issue on topics including how low-income Kurdish families make child labour decisions, the internal conversations of individual young people in transition from state care and parental cooperation as key component of alcohol prevention efforts in schools.

This paper draws on two experiences of undertaking comparative research in England, Sweden and Italy, and offers a discussion of the kinds of dilemmas raised in relation to language and meaning surfaced by these. Its primary focus is to examine the reflexive construction of meaning, both in relation generally to the workings of an international research team and, more specifically, how such construction of meaning impacts on the process of qualitative interviewing across linguistic and cultural boundaries. The article argues that a culture of reflexive research practice is helpful for approaching national differences, to facilitate understanding in internationally mixed research teams and to support and empower participants in research, in second languages and differing cultures. Overall, the paper attempts to advance some tentative ideas that other international researchers may be able to consider and deploy in relation to their own research ambitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A research–practice partnership (RPP) is a collaborative, long-term partnership between researchers and practitioners. Autoethnography is a form of qualitative research where researchers recount stories of their personal experience to reflect on and better understand the wider cultural, social, and political world around them. In this paper, we demonstrate a collaborative approach to autoethnography that can serve as a useful tool for studying and transforming school culture with teachers and administrators in a middle school. We identify the key components of our approach and provide a detailed summary of how each element was applied and highlight the ways the inquiry process contributed to self and school-level transformation. We also discuss the advantages and disadvantages of using autoethnography for RPPs in schools and discuss future directions for methodological development [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The availability, affordability and usability of communication technologies have created new ways to conduct interpersonal qualitative research. Access to digital communications remains uneven, but the online environment provides an alternative, and at times a potentially preferable, research space. As Covid-19 has interrupted and disrupted the dominant assumption that qualitative research must be conducted in person, this paper outlines possibilities and reservations of online interpersonal methods. Though the standard ethical considerations of qualitative research hold true, we argue that these are necessary, but often inadequate, in the contexts of conducting online synchronous interpersonal research. Through centring relational and reflexive practice, we consider the associated pragmatic, methodological and ethical domains from feminist and virtual–material positional perspectives. Unpacking the complexities and possibilities of researching digital environments, we present six guiding principles to inform ethically responsive, methodologically robust and pragmatically feasible approaches to conducting online interpersonal qualitative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arts-based research methods have an important place in social work scholarship. Arts-based research methods, such as poetic inquiry, highlight lived experiences through creativity, emotion, and embodiment. This paper shares findings from a qualitative study that investigated social workers' experiences with compassion in their professional practice through poetic inquiry. Findings are disseminated in a found poem that was collaboratively co-created by the researcher and study participants. The found poem highlights how compassion is a central and guiding force within social work practice. Compassion and connection remain core dimensions of the social work discipline and social work education, scholarship, and practice may benefit from continued exploration of compassion and related constructs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers the 6 A's model of social worker associations and COVID-19, which includes (i) 'Apprehend', (ii) 'act', (iii) 'advocate', (iv) 'alliance', (v) 'an emphasis on solidarity and resilience' and (vi) 'a future prospect'. The model is based on the findings of qualitative analysis of social worker associations' reports on COVID-19. It also offers insights that can be utilised in similar crises in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the important role of Qualitative research and mixed methods in the for social care practice and generation of knowledge for health. It mentions that mixed method provides guidance and on what a reviewer should look for to evaluate its quality. It also mentions that to deliver a mixed method of guidelines and research for reviewers of mixed methods study applications, it is necessary to consider the type of research.

This paper offers an account of my own epistemological journey over four decades of social work practice and research. It traces the journey from my early years as a practitioner working from an approach largely grounded in what we called practice wisdom, to my current situation as a professor of social work, undertaking research and guiding students on their own research and practice journeys.The paper begins with a vignette from a research field trip in the early 2000s – mid point in my journey and then takes a more chronological turn exploring disability research and the theme of voice and activism in research. Finally, I offer some reflections on the journey itself, what has influenced and guided my own learning, the challenges and the insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a case study of a student and instructor’s experience in a foundational research course in a Master of Social Work (MSW) program at a major university. As part of this course, students are asked to design and implement an original, practice-informed research project. One student had a particularly complex, affective response to her research project. In response to the student’s experience in the course, the instructor reconceptualized the major course assignment, drawing from the feminist concept of emotional labor, so that it would be responsive and relevant to the student’s learning. This instance of educational individualization allowed the student to take inventory of and critically reflect on her enhanced awareness of self, positionality, and power structures personally, professionally, and as a researcher, through an autoethnographic narrative and critical analysis. A central finding of this case study is that attention to the emotional labor of research opens up space for ways of knowing and learning beyond positivist, inflexible, and narrowly imagined competency-based paradigms. Moreover, this case study demonstrates the possibilities of qualitative research in accessing and exploring the affective research experience. Finally, this paper argues that emotional labor is a critical aspect of learning, teaching, and practicing research that ought to be fully considered and addressed across all approaches to inquiry, particularly those concerned with social justice. Recommendations for conceptualizing and teaching social work research courses are offered, including those related to course structure, curricular sequencing and the integration of content on epistemology and emotional labor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work grounds itself in a person-in-environment (PIE) paradigm, often centering Ecological Systems Theory in early coursework. However, there are limited methods in social work research for operationalizing PIE. This paper introduces geographic interviews as a method for understanding the relationship between people and their environments. Geographic interviews, a participant-driven qualitative geographic information systems (QGIS) method, combine go-along/walking interviews with participant markings on visual-spatial representations (e.g., architectural floorplans, neighborhood maps) to represent individual and collective experiences of a specific space. This paper illustrates a case example of using geographic interviews to understand the recently housed young adults’ experiences of a permanent supportive housing (PSH) setting from data collection through dissemination. As a method-in-development, this paper ends with key questions which may future advancement of the geographic interview methodology. Specifically, future work should explore the use of physical movement, map types, and technology/materials as variables in implementing the geographic interview methodology to understand the relationship between people and their environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Post-humanist theories and feminist new materialism are a growing feature of social work scholarship. It is timely to explore how these theories inform qualitative social work research approaches. Drawing on post-qualitative methodology and Barad's concept and method of diffraction, in this article we engage in a performative re-analysis of an account of school social work practice with a group of boys with behavioural concerns. We illuminate the interplay of neurological and behaviourist ways of knowing boys and social workers' expertise and their linkages with the materiality of the place and space of the school-based group programme. Moving beyond merely representing these material-discursive happenings, this paper affirms new social worker identities and behavioural boys' subjectivities which emerge within the entangled relations with non-human, material objects and things in schools. Doing post-qualitative inquiry, co-configures us as researchers actively involved in knowledge generation as we seek to make differences that matter in social work practice. Diffraction not only offers methods to engage with the material-discursive interface of social work knowledge practices, but also an ethical methodology for researchers to do justice in our engagement with research data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to contribute to the indigenisation discourse by illustrating how dominant discourses and cultural practices explain and perpetuate social problems. We argue that focussing on the fundamental issue of a cultural conceptualisation of social problems will contribute positively to the development of the indigenous social work practice framework. As social work education forms an important foundation for how future social work practices will be performed, we interviewed 15 social work practicum students in Ghana about the cultural underpinnings of social problems. Themes developed from the interview data suggest that culture plays a key role in conceptualising social problems in Ghana. Although not often, culture tends to underpin and perpetuate social problems, such as streetism, child marriage and child neglect. Social work practice within the indigenous framework should aim at addressing the negative impacts of the cultural undertones of social problems. Social work practitioners should increase advocacy and knowledge sharing on the cultural explanations of social problems and collaborate with community leaders to change cultural values and norms that have negative ripple effects on children, young people and women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy and research acknowledge that the quality of end-of-life care in hospitals can be poor, with families reporting significant concerns regarding physical and psychosocial care. In order to design appropriate evidenced-based care approaches, we conducted qualitative research examining the perspectives of bereaved families of patients who received end-of-life care in our health network. This paper reports on ethical dilemmas facing practitioner-researchers conducting interviews with bereaved families. We recruited 40 bereaved family members to participate in semi-structured interviews discussing the care a loved one received while a patient under the general medicine units. Bereaved participants expressed grief, humour and anger regarding their experience, and several reported perceptions of negligent and harmful care. Irrespective of the protocols in place to mitigate distress, this posed an ethical dilemma for the practitioner-researcher as a member of the health network, who needed to balance clinical and research roles when responding to distress. The practitioner-researcher's own bias and assumptions emerged when analysing families' distressing recollections. More broadly, the issues discussed have clinical implications for models of hospital bereavement support. Participants' use of photos and mementos jointly served to include the presence of the deceased in the research interview, but also highlighted the potential to utilise visual methods to examine sensitive research issues. It helps every practitioner-researcher to distinguish between research-oriented goals and clinical responsibilities to care provision as they consider their human research ethics application before beginning any research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including social work research, feminist memory work, and post-disaster research with refugee background peer researchers.

Given that promoting social justice is one of the central organizing principles of social work, it comes as no surprise that participatory action research has gained much attention among social work researchers. While much has been written about promising practices of participatory action research with various marginalized communities, there remains a dearth of participatory action research literature that focuses on trans* people, a population often under attack in current socio-political climates. In this paper, we report on a participatory action research project, in which a trans* artist worked closely with trans* youth participants (n = 5) to assist them through a creative project. Using a queer theoretical lens and drawing from the concept of "queer world-making," the participants recast cultural representations about what it means to be trans* in their chosen artistic medium. This paper suggests that art can serve as a transformative research practice with trans* youth. Our findings suggest that the rhetorical binary of trans* vulnerability and resilience does not adequately represent lived experience. We make this argument by demonstrating the following processes through which youths engaged art in this participatory action research project: (1) countering normative discourses of what it means to be trans*, (2) promoting self- reflection and expression, and (3) facilitating "queer counterpublics." In so doing, we make an argument for art as a qualitative research process that holds much promise in uncovering and challenging the normative discourse and developing a much more complex and nuanced understanding of what it means to be trans* youth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intersecting gender and other social inequalities are pertinent to women's mental health across the life course. Gendered violence and other forms of gender inequality in particular play a key role in the higher burden of psychological distress carried by young women. However, the context of gendered violence is often minimised or overlooked entirely when young women seek help or advice around mental health concerns. This is especially the case for young women under the age of 30 years. This paper reports on a research study exploring how young women in Australia understand their mental health, and the scope for new approaches to support that better address their needs. A qualitative survey undertaken with 52 Australian young women was used to explore the nature of their mental health experiences, sought to learn about the strategies they used when experiencing poor mental health and the scope for mental health peer support as an alternative approach to intervention. Responses from a diverse group of young women demonstrated that they understood the role that gendered violence and gender inequality played in their mental health. Findings point to the risk of slippage between young women's understandings of their lived experience and those of traditional service providers, demonstrating the risks associated with minimising or ignoring of the gendered nature of young women's mental health problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the participatory research with older people, research and technology, and the emotional impact of social work on practitioners.

This paper presents results from a study in Aotearoa New Zealand 1 which explored the ideas of social work practitioners on public perceptions of social work and how to improve them. This qualitative research was part of a Master's project for two of the authors and followed on from two previous quantitative studies on this topic in Aotearoa. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 social work practitioners. Thematic analysis was used to create themes concerning what the perceived public perception was, what contributed to it, and how to improve it. The findings have implications for being better able to understand factors that contribute to the public perception of social work so that it may be improved, for increasing the public's understanding of social work, and for recruitment of students into the profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much of the literature on teaching qualitative research consists of instructional philosophies or descriptions of classroom activities. Little has been written about the actual experience of a qualitative research course, especially from the students’ perspective. Writing about a course without the voices of those being taught would be like critiquing a meal only by speaking with those who cooked it: we might know what was intended but not what was experienced. Thus, this collaborative paper, written from the perspectives of both instructor and students, offers a unique multilensed view of a course on qualitative social work research. Doctoral students from diverse backgrounds describe their struggles, frustrations, and moments of illumination as they engaged with this new paradigm of knowledge. Because no teaching module will affect all students in the same way, their reflections also explore the role of culture and individual history in shaping response to qualitative methods. Theories of adult learning are suggested as a way to assist the process of adjustment to what are, for many, unsettling new concepts. Students’ experiences are then compared with the existing literature. The paper concludes with applications of qualitative research for social justice and human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interest in qualitative methodologies has grown over recent decades, encouraged by alternative research paradigms in the critical and postmodernist tradition. The array of interpretative frameworks now available to qualitative researchers suggests a potential for pluralist study designs that are not widely employed at present. Drawing on doctoral research in the field of child protection, this paper explores the scope for combining two such frameworks: interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) and critical discourse analysis (CDA). It is argued from a critical realist perspective that these methodologies pose different but complementary questions about a given research topic. Within an integrated study design, they can provide a dual lens with which to explore qualitative information, which is interpreted both as lived experience and discursive practice. Textual examples are used in order to show how separate sets of findings are generated using IPA and CDA, and how these may usefully inform each other. The paper proceeds to discuss some broader issues about how researchers produce and interpret qualitative information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work qualitative research and the work of Norman Denzin have much in common. Norman's work was values-based, built on notions of justice, care, dignity, worth, equality, and self-determination with the purpose of identifying and describing problematic social conditions and, in turn, taking action to bring about social change and transformation. This statement fits social work perfectly. In this article, I describe the work of Norman Denzin, show how he promoted qualitative social work research, and how his suggestions for social work researchers to incorporate critical perspectives in our work was calling us back to ourselves. Most of all, he affirmed what we were already doing and want to do better. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On March 3, 2019, an EF4 tornado devastated the rural Alabama communities of Beauregard and Smith Station, killing 23 people and causing direct injuries to another 97. This storm was unusually devastating, with twice the predicted casualty rate based on the tornado's power, the impacted population, and impacted housing stock. In this paper, we apply qualitative methods from anthropology, geography, and planning to better understand the social context of this unusually devastating tornado. Recognizing that there are multiple formulations of the problem of disasters, we aim to highlight how interdisciplinary qualitative research can deepen our understanding of tornado disasters. Combining policy analysis, political economic critique, and ethnographic description, we seek to showcase how qualitative research enables us to interrogate and reimagine the problem of disasters. Rather than simply juxtaposing qualitative and quantitative methods, we emphasize how the heterogeneity of qualitative research methods can strengthen interdisciplinary research projects by generating dialogue about the multiple contexts relevant to understanding a social problem. While problem definition remains a central challenge to establishing a dialogue between anthropology and social work, here, we intend to extend this discussion to larger interdisciplinary collaborations. Situating the issue of problem formation within a broader ecology of qualitative inquiry, we highlight how dialogue about problem definition can, itself, produce meaningful insights into how we understand disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qualitative methods open analytical pathways and present specific challenges, particularly for early career scholars forging a path in a field dominated by quantitative inquiry. However, for many scholars, qualitative methods reflect a particular ontological point of view, which tends toward privileging the experiences of groups that are often marginalized in research. Given this point of view, qualitative methodologies provide an opportunity to reframe the participant’s en vivo description of their own experience. In so doing, qualitative methods invite scholars to create new analytical pathways. This paper highlights the work of social work scholars using qualitative methods to forge new paths in studying emergent phenomena, e.g., Internet gang banging, transgender perspectives on aging, etc. The paper also explores the use of qualitative methods to develop new analytical perspectives on experiences of historic and contemporary trauma related to the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and in child welfare settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The approach to standardized services in Norwegian mental health care is tailored to the needs of the majority population, focusing on diagnoses and overshadows an approach that understands, values and emphasizes Sámi storytelling and everyday life. This study aims to contribute knowledge regarding the promotion of user involvement in mental health care from the perspectives of Sámi mental health care users. A narrative approach offers an opportunity to unravel an indigenous approach to mental health care and user involvement. People organize their storytelling according to culturally available narratives. This paper focuses on 9 Sámi men's and women's stories related to user involvement in mental health care services. Through a thematic analysis of personal stories, we emphasize how the participants make sense of their needs as patients in a culturally adapted mental health context and their experiences living in Sámi core areas. The following four themes are identified as prerequisites for user involvement in services: (1) the expectation of raising children to be independent, (2) the importance of accepting and recognizing the Sámi identity, (3) the need to live in close relations with nature and family, and 4) the right to be in the Sámi mode. Based on the results of our analysis, we find that user involvement among Sámi mental health care users is related to important Sámi values and norms within the culture and that treatment without these important values ​​could adversely affect user involvement in mental health services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The theme of mistrust in resettlement contexts is largely overlooked in refugee discourses. Through a qualitative inquiry of post-migration experiences of four women raising children alone in Brisbane, Australia, this paper outlines how the presence of mistrust could at times create difficult resettlement circumstances for these women, who then needed to negotiate additional obstacles in everyday life. The definition of social mistrust used here is a form of deliberate and ongoing suspicion about lone refugee women’s choices and lifestyles from other community members. Importantly, the women achieved a sense of well-being despite experiencing mistrust, both in inter-group and intra-group contexts, indicating that they conceptualised access to and benefits from social networks with different emphases on trust. Sociocultural narratives of mistrust, particularly gender-specific perspectives can enrich refugee discourses and challenge established notions of trust inherent to understandings of social networks in resettlement. The findings discussed in this paper contribute to debunking the ‘myth’ of homogeneity in relation to refugee groups and demonstrate the diversity of experiences among sub-groups of refugee women. The theme of mistrust, particularly among women, is an oft-neglected aspect and requires further attention. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Children are often the unintended victims of incarceration, and are frequently subjected to extreme hardship following the arrest of a parent, but their right to information is always compromised in the name of protection. Disclosure of incarceration can be equally challenging for both the family caregivers and the children. This paper presents the data from interviews about disclosure of incarceration, looking at how 10 caregiver–child dyadic pairs interacted and handled disclosure in the process. Disclosure is taken as a continuous process requiring the caregivers and the children to negotiate and make sense of it, rather than a static, one-off decision. Three dimensions of protection have been identified (i.e., protection from future blame, protection of the child, and protection of the inmate), together with the intent to use the disclosure for educational purposes. Although there was not a case where the children protested having limited or no information, they varied in their responses. A lack of interest in asking for essential information and intentional avoidance of the topic of parent's incarceration have been observed in some children. Self-regulated submission by the child is a result of many factors, including a tacit demand to acknowledge parental authority and a caring intent not to add to the caregiver's burdens. This article also highlights implications and recommendations for changing professional practice and policy guidelines to promote children's rights and their healthy growth amidst the challenges of life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Latino youth experience unique stressors as they navigate two cultural contexts. While a substantial amount of research has been conducted investigating Latino youths' experiences of acculturation, most have been conducted in cities with a substantial Latino community, with less research focusing on emerging communities, or areas with small, but growing cultural communities. The aim of this study was to understand Latino youths' experiences of acculturation stressors when living in an emerging Latino community. To achieve this aim, 30 youth (ages 7–16) living in an emerging Latino community were recruited to participate in a creative-arts based research method in which they were placed in groups based on developmental stage and participated in six dialogue sessions. During sessions, youth were asked to paint a picture based on prompts and then discuss the topics that emerged in their paintings in small groups. Prompts were designed to illicit youths' experiences with acculturation stress and Latino identity. Thematic analysis of qualitative data indicated that the role of language was featured prominently in youths' experiences. In this paper, we discuss the role of bilingualism in multiple contexts in Latino youth experience of acculturation when living in an emerging Latino community. The results suggest that bilingualism is central to the identity of Latino youth in this context and may be essential to incorporate into interventions that aim to facilitate positive youth development among Latino youth living in emerging Latino communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participatory research methodologies have expanded the opportunities for critical, emancipatory and democratic health and social work research. However, their practical application in research with vulnerable participants has historically been challenging due to ethical, practical and theoretical concerns. Individuals who are homeless are typically seen as 'hard-to-reach', transient, 'hidden' and even chaotic participant populations. Unsurprisingly, examples of the use of innovative participatory research techniques with those groups have been relatively scarce. This paper aimed to address this gap by discussing the application of one such technique – the mobile phone diary in research with multiply disadvantaged homeless adults. Diary methods are situated within the qualitative research on health, illness and social marginality, and the enhanced capabilities of the mobile phone diary are highlighted. The author illustrates the application of the mobile phone diary in his participatory research on the everyday life narratives of adults with serious mental illness (SMI) who were homeless. The process of designing the mobile phone diary is detailed. Following this, participant testimonies of their use of the mobile phone diary are presented. They demonstrate the participatory and inclusive nature, as well as the cathartic and empowering potential, of this technique. The methodological contributions and challenges and the theoretical generativity of the mobile phone diary method are discussed. The mobile phone diary is a feasible approach for eliciting evocative, contextualised and nuanced accounts of the lived experience of homelessness, social isolation, coping and recovery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses social workers' moral agency in addressing child abuse and neglect. We argue that ethically sound social work requires the capacity to exercise strong, multidimensional moral agency. The contribution is based on a qualitative interpretative meta-synthesis of four studies representing different forms of child abuse and neglect in varied contexts. Drawing on our analysis, we identify three thematic categories of moral considerations in terms of social workers' moral work in addressing child abuse and neglect: genders and generations, agencies and responsibilities, and families and communities. We then proceed to posit four dimensions of moral work in child and family social work – individual; cultural and communal; societal and political; and global – and argue that if they are to exercise strong moral agency, social workers must negotiate these intersecting contextual dimensions. Recognising the salience of these dimensions, how they increasingly intersect, and what this demands of social workers is necessary for the profession. Social workers must embrace individually sensitive, culturally translative, politically engaged and globally aware moral agency. This is crucial in elaborating context-sensitive practice that critically engages with moral complexities when working with individuals, families and communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Reporting data from a case study of a collaborative systematic review, this paper discusses the impact service user involvement might have on research, and how research might benefit from this. Methods This was a qualitative case study. The researcher analysed process data on the collaboration in the form of meeting transcripts and minutes, reflective interviews and the researchers’ own field diary. The review was also compared with two systematic reviews on a similar topic, using the AMSTAR checklist. Results The young people had influence at all stages of the review, but most importantly shifted its focus from healthcare to education, emphasising education as an important determinant of health. Conclusion Young people involved in this review influenced the researcher’s reviewing as well as the review, which shows that involving service users in research is important in order to reduce researcher bias in social care research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research explores how feminist women respond to male allies' unintended sexism. I use a feminist autoethnographic method to document and analyze vignettes that explore interpersonal conflicts about unintended sexism. Autoethnography provides the methodology that allows me to link the personal challenges of responding to sexism in caring relationships within the broader cultural context. Three case vignettes demonstrate the processes I undertook. As a social worker, I draw upon process-oriented psychology and feminism to examine the vignettes and analyze key concepts in the experience of responding to unintended sexism. I discuss the importance of communication between social workers who are feminist and male allies when unintended sexism occurs. Finally, I examine the issue of feminists doing the majority of the work challenging sexism. In sharing my personal experiences of responding to male allies' unintended sexism, I anticipate these stories and explorations can be helpful for social workers who are feminist or male allies concerned with communicating about unintended sexism in caring relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Home and belonging are emerging areas of social work research. Very few studies in the social work discipline critically examine how home is broadly experienced or understood. Whilst the notion of home is contested, social work researchers can explore meanings of home in their quest to understand how social workers can contribute to developing a sense of community and belonging. This article presents the findings of an intersectional qualitative study that explored meanings of home in a capital city of Australia, drawing implications for social work. A thematic analysis of 13 semi-structured interviews found that home was experienced as both a material and emotional place. Home was associated with (1) the material security of housing, including homeownership and the safety of suburbs and neighbourhoods; (2) a connection to multiple homes and the making of home in migration, such as when re-settling in a new country; (3) belonging to a family, including emotional connections to lost family members or acknowledging a supportive family and (4) religious, ethnic and cultural self-expression. This paper argues that researching meanings of home is relevant to social work as a discipline that espouses human rights and social justice because a sense of home is central to the politics of belonging to a safe community and society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces models and techniques for synthesizing multiple qualitative studies on a topic. Qualitative research synthesis is a diverse set of methods for combining the data or the results of multiple studies on a topic to generate new knowledge, theory and applications. Use of qualitative research synthesis is rapidly expanding across disciplines. Aggregative and interpretive models of qualitative research synthesis are defined and distinguished. Several interpretive models are detailed. Their strengths are identified, and their limitations and areas of methodological ambiguity are critically examined. The steps of qualitative research synthesis are discussed and challenges specific to doing qualitative synthesis are identified and explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theorizing social work qualitative methodologies have always been closely related to the context of the studied subjects. This paper offers the framework of context-informed, counter-hegemonic qualitative research for theorizing research in conflict zones. Based on a case study of a group of Jewish and Palestinian social work researchers who examined together the effect of the loss of home on families during an ongoing political conflict, this paper explores the impact of participating in a research team on the researcher’s perceptions and study of otherness and otherization in the context of asymmetries of power. Analysis of the group dynamics discovered: (1) a growing ability to see and acknowledge the other, accompanied by a growing willingness to be attentive; (2) a growing ability to empathically listen to and hear the experiences of suffering of the other; (3) overcoming silencing by allowing voices of dissent, pain and resilience; and (4) creating a liminal space of “safe haven” for the researchers. The paper explores the development of context-informed group reflexivity leading to emancipatory consciousness and academic activism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the interdisciplinary literature in order to define core content areas and course structures used in teaching qualitative research. The available literature on teaching qualitative research is very small and consists mainly of “one off” papers that do not develop topics in depth. This article identified 10 broad topics as important to the effective teaching of qualitative research. A variety of curriculum structures and course formats currently used in social work education are examined. Approaches to teaching design and theory, and more project-based approaches to active leading are distinguished. Recommendations for expanding and enhancing the teaching of qualitative research conclude the article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As incarceration rates rise worldwide, increasing numbers of parents are separated from their children. Researchers have studied the psychosocial impact on inmates and their families extensively. However, few researchers have examined how their own perspectives affect the collection and interpretation of data, specifically about parenting in correctional settings. This paper consider methodological implications of conducting research with incarcerated mothers and fathers, employing critical reflexivity to explore researchers' individual and collective experiences in a study in Australian correctional facilities. Using ourselves as informants, we examine how the context and life experiences of 'researcher' and 'researched' interact during interviews in a unique and emotionally charged environment. Correctional research requires careful adaptations to collect meaningful data from inmates and recognise their vulnerability as parents. The emotional content of interviews also has implications for analysing and interpreting research data. Our focus on interviewees as mothers and fathers, rather than as offenders, generated greater understanding of the needs of parents in custody. Recognising researchers' feelings, experiences and perspectives on parenthood can enrich research with families affected by the criminal justice and child protection systems. These insights can also inform the understanding and practice of social workers, health practitioners, educators and students who work with marginalised parents and children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lesbian, gay, and bisexual older adults are more likely than their heterosexual peers to experience health disparities, discrimination from healthcare providers based on sexual orientation, and rejection from their family of origin, all of which can complicate medical care and decision making, as well as end-of-life arrangements. Yet, relatively few studies of lesbian, gay, and bisexual seniors have looked at motivations for advance care and end-of-life planning, which are strategies that can help ensure that healthcare treatment and end-of-life wishes are enacted as desired. The present qualitative study investigated this topic with a purposive sample of nine lesbian, gay, and bisexual and same-gender-loving adults in a metropolitan region of the Southeastern United States. The study involved in-depth face-to-face interviews, followed by a brief pen-and-paper survey. Participants' ages ranged from 65 to 77; the sample included five men and four women. Six individuals were white/Caucasian, while three were African American/Black. We identified three themes related to motivations for advance care and end-of-life planning: wanting a sense of agency, learning from others, and reducing conflict and confusion for loved ones. We discuss the importance of these findings for social work practice with lesbian, gay, and bisexual older adults and for social work education, as well as implications for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The topic of interest in this paper is the relationship between children who live in kinship care and their birth parents – through childhood and adulthood. The focus is on what meaning and content children themselves ascribe to such relationships and how this changes over time. To explore this question, we draw on a qualitative longitudinal data set, in which children who grew up in kinship foster care in Norway were interviewed over a 15-year period. We have selected three cases, where we follow two girls and one boy through their three interviews as children (T1: 11–12 years old), emerging adults (T2: 20–21 years old) and young adults (T3: 28–29 years old). Through the adoption of a methodological approach with similarities to biographical approaches, our analysis gives unique insight into the interviewees' relationships with their birth parents – how they are expressed in each interview as their lives unfold and as circumstances change. More specifically, the analysis gives insight into different types of parent–child relationships and how they may change over time. However, it also shows that the interviewees have different resources available in managing such relationships. This is an issue rarely recognised in child welfare research or practice, yet it is essential if we want to understand the relationship between children who grow/grew up in foster care arrangements and their birth parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]