Why Clinical Research is Important in Social Work
Clinical social work is a nuanced profession. With many layers and many ways to look at this illustrious career, it’s important to understand that beyond counseling, there is a wide range of contributions to be made to the field. Research in social work practice is one of these major contributions that aren’t really talked about but is very influential and important for all types of social workers, clinical and non-clinical.
What is Clinical Research?
In the study of health and wellness in individuals, clinical research can be anything from determining the safety and effectiveness of medications to understanding how to improve the medical equipment used to diagnose individuals. In the world of clinical social work, clinical research focuses on mental illness, from the assessment, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of all mental illnesses.
Why is Clinical Research Important to Social Work?
While it might look like the practice of research in social work is completely divided from those social workers with their boots on the ground, this is not how they should interact. It is imperative that they are interlinked, with each one influencing the other, helping to improve and grow after each learning experience.
Social work practice helps to create the evidence and studies that clinical research will examine and study, looking at the minutiae to see how and why certain people are the way they are.
The practice of research in social work should be used as a guidebook for clinical social work practice, while also helping to push the boundaries of how social work practice looks at certain situations. Giving a different perspective in the world of clinical social work can open new doors. There is a wide variety of ways clinical research can open these boundaries:
Identifying the Impact of a Social Program
While the implementation of a social program or policy can be done, it is important to carefully observe how this social program, over a longer period of time, has influenced and shifted the community around it. This gives social workers the opportunity to constantly tweak and improve the program over the years.
Identifying the Causes of Social Phenomena
Research in social work practice is about understanding how real-world situations really affect us, and then further examining how such social phenomena can shift, change, and influence the rest of society further down the road. Identifying the causes of social change is the first step in making positive influential changes.
Where can you Study Clinical Social Work?
At ICSW, America’s leading graduate school PhD program for clinical social work, prioritizing our students and their desire to develop clinician skills at both the MA level and the doctorate level is our goal. Learning everything from appropriate intake to case management, and much more.