Social Work Unravel

Interview with Adoniah Simon - Social Work graduate from Andrews University, Michigan

This interview was conducted to understand what precautions, methods, and strategies are used when dealing with traumatic events in the family unit. The answers are focused towards the American system. Therefore, the notes displayed below are what I have taken from the interview that is related to my project.

Most of the social cases with young people that he had worked with came from criminal behaviour. When asking about the reasoning, he said it's usually a direct result of the economic strain in the area. Within the American system location, schools, infrastructure, drug use, petty crime, stealing, domestic violence, broken families, mental health issues (even within the family), families in and out of the justice system, and in and out of their lives plays a major role in why they end up needed social services.

Social media - creates a community and feeds back.

Social Work

It's an institution as well as a service that is focused on people. They are the frontline of...anything. While emergency services are trained to handle the specific emergency, the people aspect is ideally handled by the social services. Without proper training, a situation can escalate very quickly. In the training part, they get very hands of training, and also have units on political science, sociology, psychology, and economics as they all play a major part.

They consider a 'person' as one element in an environment. Taking into consideration that there are other factors playing a part in their lives, they treat every human as an individual with individual concerns. They operate in an ecological system working with other departments. While they can offer immediate relief and guide them in proper directions, they also enforce the idea of 'self-empowerment'; to get out of bad situation by their own will power. 'You are the agent of change'. They follow their code of ethics, and within it there is a fair share of 'hand holding vs empowerment' depending on the situation. They stray away from telling their customers what to do, and sometimes what they need the most is guidance.

Adoniah also mentions that sometimes the problems are not limited to the psyche, but it can be within other means such as financials or health. Sometimes, they need the validation that 'they're not crazy', that there are external factors making them act irrationally. Some irrational thoughts can be long developed thoughts of childhood. There is a lack of trust within the subject and their external connections.

Dialectical Behaviour Theory.

What is truth? What is reality? Heart vs heart. They offer the ability to digest their thoughts and understand reality.

Repeated patterns can be observed, and aided via nature vs nurture.

Adoniah says there is a default personality that you are born with, and then it is affected by your environment.

OCEAN - Personality Test is used to understand their customers. Adoniah says that personality is simply a habit, and you can break that habit as you break any other habit.

From what I have gathered, there is personality change is a key element in my project. By asking two generations to change perceptions that have been conditioned by culture, tradition, and grouped opinions, I am trying to break a habit. More research needs to be done on which behaviour patterns fit into this specific situation.