Life care planning: a role for social workers.

Life care planning is a method of assessing future care needs and associated costs for the lifetime of individuals who have experienced catastrophic injury or have chronic health care needs. The culmination of the life care planning process is a document known as the Life Care Plan. Social workers, especially medical social workers, because of their education and health-related experience are excellent candidates for becoming Life Care Planners upon meeting certification requirements. This article describes life care planning and how social workers can enter this field.

Approaching child abuse treatment from the perspective of empathy.

Research identifies empathy as a moderating variable in the display of aggression. Research further suggests that empathy is a significant variable in the effective parenting of children. Studies in child abuse show that abusive parents score significantly lower on empathy measures as compared to their nonabusive counterparts. The purpose of this theoretical article is (1) to suggest based on the literature that empathy training should be a core component in treatment strategies with abusive parents. A variety of approaches to empathy training will be suggested; (2) to encourage the implementation of empathy training in interventions with abusive parents and the measurement through research of the effectiveness of this approach to treatment on a short and long-term basis.

Homelessness among adults raised as foster children: a survey of drop-in center users.

74 homeless persons were asked if they had ever been in foster care. Twelve (16%) answered affirmatively. Compared with the estimated baseline of adults who had been in foster care in the same locality, these homeless persons reported histories of foster care at four times the base rate in the general population. This finding suggests that children in foster care are at risk of serious dysfunction as adults.

Locus of control in foster and nonfoster children.

Fifty-six foster children from a public metropolitan social service agency and a comparable group of fifty-six nonfoster children from the same community completed the Nowicki Strickland Internal-External Locus of Control Scale and a brief demographic questionnaire. Results indicated a statistically significant difference in external control orientation for female foster children but not for males as compared to their nonfoster counterparts. The difference was present regardless of the number of years in foster care. Data suggest that placement into foster care and its precipitating events impact on locus of control orientation of female foster children.

Current practices in performance appraisal.

A survey of 196 private voluntary social service agencies showed that two methods of performance appraisal were most widely used in evaluating employee performance, i.e., essays and rating scales. The results-oriented method of performance appraisal, generally viewed in management literature as the most effective approach to performance evaluation, was not widely used. The primary purposes of performance appraisal were seen by agencies participating in the research as performance improvement and salary or wage increment. The author reviews the strengths and weaknesses of alternative methods of performance appraisal currently used in human service agencies. The results-oriented method of employee evaluation is discussed with an emphasis on the implementation of this performance appraisal technique.