NASW NEWS

From the President The Research-Practice Connection by Terry Mizrahi, MSW, Ph.D. June 2002

Social work as a profession has the role and responsibility to improve the quality of life for individuals and groups and address the social ills of a society. In those endeavors, the critical connections among research, practice and policy are inextricably intertwined.

The popular terms used to characterize those connections are “evidenced-based practice” and “practice-based research.” Our goal must be that those practicing social work understand, use and contribute to research and policy, and those doing research identify the importance and application of their findings for practitioners and policymakers. Our policy advocates connect to both.

While there have been schisms in the past, this is the time to promote what social workers know (our knowledge), what social workers do (our skills) and who social workers are (our values) to politicians, the press, the public and our clients.

So, here’s my message to researchers: Let’s not regard the research enterprise as an entity unto itself. There are multiple ways of viewing and “doing” our profession — it’s “an art and a science.” Practice wisdom and clinical judgment count.

Given the complexity of social and organizational systems and the necessity to protect human participants, social work researchers can be proud of the studies they are pursuing, but they also need to be humble when they exhort social workers to focus only on a certain method or scope of research. Ethics and funding often drive the research enterprise. Government and private funders don’t always want to study complex, controversial, sensitive subjects.

And to my practitioner colleagues, I raise three questions: First, are you making a difference with your clients and constituencies? Second, if the answer is yes, how do you know you are you making a difference? Once you begin to formulate an answer to that question for your caseload, population, service, agency or community, then you are in the research mode. You are being a critical thinker; you are defining, articulating and evaluating outcomes. Third, who else has made a difference with your defined group? You have an obligation to know and critique the research literature, to use and eventually contribute to systemically formulated best practices.

Important goals for NASW are to support efforts to increase the pool of qualified, competitive social work researchers and to promote a public research agenda informed by a social work perspective. Defining the research questions and identifying the problems to be solved are political and ideological activities; therefore, social workers must be at the table to shape those activities.

For example, we are helping to synthesize the research being done on welfare reform, poverty and the work force and are using it through our Blue Ribbon Panel on Economic Security to influence the debate over the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families program and to improve practice in the public welfare sector.

NASW also supports these efforts as a founding member of the Institute for the Advancement of Social Work Research and the ANSWER coalition, working to obtain a federal center for social work research. And we are developing closer connections with the Society for Social Work and Research.

We know that knowledge, information and data alone won’t change the world. It is the power to put what we know into action that will be the key to our success. We, together with our clients, allies and colleagues, have to be persuasive with our documentation and evidence. This is how we move from discovery to influence, from knowledge to power.

To contact Terry Mizrahi: president@naswdc.org