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This article builds on methodological literature addressing ways in which qualitative research interviewing can utilise principles derived from psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, focussing on the sharing of interpretations and formulations with research participants. We review the accounts of different researchers who have considered the sharing of formulations and more formalised quasi-dynamic interpretative comments in this type of psychoanalytically informed interview research. Via this review and considering our experience as practitioner researchers, we suggest that careful reflection is required. The notion of interpretative work in psychoanalytic psychotherapy is potentially easily misapprehended because the term interpretation can refer to a range of (at times, very different) practices. Moreover, the terms of reference for dialogue in research and psychotherapy are fundamentally different for those engaged in them; an interpretation or feedback will not likely be received in the same fashion in a research interview as it would be in a psychotherapy session. Therefore, would-be research participants should be informed about the type of interview being used, with questions asked about their expectations. Furthermore, they should be encouraged to speak about what they may anticipate will be related to them of findings/analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why you should read this article: • To enhance your understanding of young people's use of digital technology • To learn how digital technology can be used to provide mental health services for young people • To recognise the importance of considering young people's abilities and preferences when implementing digital interventions Background: Digital technology affords opportunities to expand mental healthcare beyond the clinic setting, supporting sustainable delivery. A pilot qualitative study was undertaken with a view to using the experience gained from it to develop a substantive project in this area. Aim: To identify and better understand the perceived barriers and benefits to using digital technologies when delivering mental healthcare to young people. Method: In-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with three young people under the care of a child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team. The interview data were analysed thematically. Findings: Three main themes were identified from the interviews: digital identity and digital literacy; trusting and accessing digital health resources; and therapeutic relationships, choice and convenience. Conclusion: The findings of this pilot study reinforce the importance of avoiding a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to integrating digital technology in CAMHS. It was also identified that it is important to carefully consider the involvement of parents when conducting mental health research with children and young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a recent contribution to this journal, Cummings (2023) reports findings from a preliminary qualitative study of practitioner viewpoints regarding digitally delivered mental health support to care-experienced young people. Cummings' study highlights the need to engage with professional experiences of using digital methods with this group, both during and outside of the COVID-19 pandemic. A response to - and commentary on – Cummings' contribution is provided, to advance discussion of issues identified by the research. We reflect on our experience as practitioners and researchers working in and alongside specialist child and adolescent mental health service teams serving care-experienced children and young people. We focus on workspaces in remote working, therapeutic technique in online and telephone-based care, and virtues and challenges of remote care delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why you should read this article: • To identify the benefits that group-based psychoeducation intervention may bring to inpatient care settings for older people with mental health issues • To better understand how group-based interventions are experienced by older people with mental health issues • To reflect on some of the challenges involved in introducing group-based interventions in inpatient care settings This article reports on a service evaluation of a group-based psychoeducation programme for older people in an inpatient mental healthcare setting. It sought to explore how the programme was experienced by patients and staff, as well as its acceptability and the feasibility for implementation in the longer term. Via questionnaires, views were gathered from patients and staff. A focus group interview with staff facilitating the group sessions was also undertaken, and patient attendance records for sessions were collected and compared with demographic data relating to the two wards housed in the unit where the programme took place. The programme was generally viewed as a positive addition to care delivery by staff and patient respondents in offering an adjunct to pharmacological treatment, increasing familiarity with psychology staff, encouraging patients to develop a greater degree of mastery regarding their health and fostering mutual support among the patient community. The role of the ward environment in supporting access to group-based intervention is also considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on mental health service research, trauma-informed care (TIC), and the use of freedom of information (FoI) requests for data collection. Topics include the limited availability of TIC training for NHS professionals, the role of FoI requests in gathering data, and criticisms of TIC implementation including concerns about TIC potentially obscuring broader social issues related to trauma.

Freedom of information (FoI) legislation has been represented as a valuable but underused means of generating otherwise unavailable data from public authorities in health and social care research. This article complements extant literature on the use of FoI requests for research intended to inform health and social care policy and improve the quality of practice. Reflections are provided on challenges and ethical considerations, drawing on relevant literature and the authors' experience undertaking studies addressing different topics in mental health and child welfare using FoI requests as the primary means of data collection. The recommendations are practically orientated. They are aimed primarily at social work and mental health researchers who may have limited knowledge of how FoI requests might be used in their work but be curious about the application of this approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article stages a discussion on the role of social psychiatry in present-day child and adolescent mental health care. Taking a broad perspective, it considers the growing demand for mental health services for children and young people and how social psychiatry can be situated in the current framework of psychiatry as a medical specialty as well as within child and adolescent mental health care provision more widely. Avenues available to expand social psychiatry's reach and impact in the field of child and adolescent mental health are also addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes an innovative initiative based on principles of traumainformed care which involves clinicians from a specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team providing input to youth justice services. At a local level, the project seeks to help address recognised gaps in service provision whereby children and young people involved with the criminal justice system are afforded inconsistent access to care and treatment yet recognised as being at increased risk for having experienced early adversity and suffering mental health difficulties. The article takes stock of the project's development via reference to three interlinked strands of work it incorporates: work supporting staff; direct work with children and young people; and training workshops for professionals. Reference is also made to the findings of an evaluation of the project. In so doing, the article adds further support to arguments for a senior clinician role in CAMHS provision linked to youth justice services, and the necessity of staff training to embed this role and support the recognition of trauma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The topic of professional self-disclosure has been subject to uneven levels of attention in the social work literature. Although many writers and researchers have addressed the topic in the context of clinical social work, there has been limited dedicated attention to its use and role in routine practice in child protection and child welfare settings. This article is concerned with a specific type of self-disclosure: what social workers say to the parents they work with about whether they themselves are parents or not. Drawing on interview material from a research study concerned with how children's services professionals experience the suffering of parents, it explores the psycho-social dynamics of social workers investing in different positions about making or refusing to make disclosures about their parental status. This allows for differentiated insight into the contexts that surround parental status disclosure and highlights how decision making around whether and what to disclose can be led more by anxieties and concerns about the maintenance of a particular professional identity than deliberation about potential benefits to parents and the working relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article adds to literature addressing research beneficence from a psychoanalytic perspective, providing reflections focussing on notions of containment and container-contained dynamics as derived from the Kleinian/post-Kleinian tradition of psychoanalysis. It does so by reference to the accounts of participants in a study which explored how professionals working in local authority children's services in England experience the suffering of parents. In this research, a psychoanalytically informed interview approach was used, and space was provided for participants to reflect on the experience of participation. The variable representation of this experience is considered along with the experience of the researcher carrying out the interviews. Questions are raised about using the language of containment in the context of this research approach and whether this may say more about a researcher's desire to be helpful to participants and less about participants' actual experiences (and a genuinely psychoanalytically based understanding of them). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

British psycho-social studies is a new paradigm of transdisciplinary scholarship situated at the borderlands of social and psychological theory. Its development has been represented as providing avenues for a more critical and reflexive engagement with psychoanalysis in social work, disentangled from the unfavourable meanings with which psychoanalysis has been associated (e.g. as apolitical and reductively focussed on intrapsychic dynamics). However, much remains to be said about the implications of methodological developments and debate in psycho-social studies for social work research, particularly in terms of the impetus it provides for reflecting on the transformations brought about in resituating psychoanalytic concepts and practices away from their traditional clinical context in social research and theory. This article draws from doctoral research concerned specifically with the theory and practice of research interviewing. It provides an account of the development of this research and explores the role of interpretation as part of a psychoanalytically-informed interview approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hollway and Jefferson's free association narrative interview method is an approach to qualitative research interviewing that draws on concepts and practices traditionally associated with psychoanalytic therapy. Owing to this psychosocial framework, the method is an attractive proposition for psychodynamically orientated practitioner-researchers. Various studies by researchers in counselling and clinical psychology and the allied fields of social work and mental health nursing have made use of the method or aspects of it. This article describes and provides reflections on the completion of one study informed by the method involving interviews with social workers and intensive family intervention professionals working in English local authority children's services. The article is concerned with some of the more practical issues involved in doing this research: gaining access to and interviewing a suitable sample of professionals; the format of interviews and interviewing technique; the analysis of interview material; and the role of researcher reflexivity and the use of the researcher's 'countertransference' experience (with a specific concern for countertransference boredom). Overall, the article contributes to furthering thinking about the free association narrative interview method as a tool of social work research and what it means to do qualitative research with social work and child welfare professionals in a psychoanalytically informed way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work change programmes rooted in a particular practice theory and design are increasingly a fixture of UK local authority social work and the focus of a small but developing body of research. However, in this research to date, there has been a lack of engagement with the perspectives of families. In this article, we detail findings from 23 family interviews undertaken as part of an independent evaluation of a social work change programme in a single local authority. These findings afford insight into the positive influence change programmes can have on engaging families and re-routing practitioners to work in a relationship-based way. They also illustrate the limitations for reshaping practice in the context of rising levels of need, a paucity of supportive provision, and administrative burdens remaining the same as before the introduction of a change programme. As part of the article, we offer some brief reflections on the recruitment of families for evaluative study to assist other researchers and local authority professionals who may be involved in comparable evaluations in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the development of a digital ‘toolkit’ for adoptive parents in the children’s social care service of a single local authority is described. A work in progress, the toolkit is to be accessed by parents online and involves a series of videos around parenting topics and the post-adoption therapeutic work undertaken in the service, as well as links to other parenting information and resources. The article combines accounts of the toolkit’s development in the authority and a piece of ‘practice research’ being carried out that makes use of a DVD version. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]