ABSTRACT
On March 12th, 2020 the Norwegian government announced what later became known as ‘the lockdown' of Norway due to the outbreak of COVID-19. This led to major changes in society, in which social distancing became the ‘new normal' in everyday life. For social workers, this meant adapting to ‘new' social problems among vulnerable groups, as well as comprehensive changes in their working conditions and interactions with clients. Many social workers communicated with clients on digital platforms before the pandemic, but Norway's COVID-19 social distancing policies changed the terms for using these platforms. This article investigates the impact of the pandemic on the ways Norwegian social workers involve themselves with digital technology in their interactions with clients. We employ domestication theory to investigate how social workers shape and navigate these new circumstances triggered by the pandemic, using a three-dimensional model that includes practical, symbolic and cognitive levels of analysis. The data underlying this article consist of 16 semi-structured interviews with social workers from seven different social services in Norway. The interviews were conducted approximately one month after the lockdown. The digital transformation within Norwegian social services, together with the changes related to the pandemic, has created new ways of practicing social work. One of the key findings concerns how social workers co-produce and adapt the use of technology to what they believe is important in interactions with their clients. In this adaption, they seek to preserve core values related to social work practices and professional development. The changes in working methods and approaches due to COVID-19 restrictions have also challenged the traditional understanding of roles and priorities underlying social work practices. In this process, new ways of digital interactions were developed. © 2021. All Rights Reserved.