What is the relationship between social worker motivational interviewing skills and in-session indicators of parent/carer motivation in child and family social work conversations?

Whittaker, Charlotte 2024. What is the relationship between social worker motivational interviewing skills and in-session indicators of parent/carer motivation in child and family social work conversations? PhD Thesis, Cardiff University. Item availability restricted.

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Abstract

This thesis explores the relationship between social worker skills in motivational interviewing (MI) and in-session indicators of parent/carer motivation to change. An extensive body of research suggests that MI skills are associated with client “change talk” which is in turn associated with behavioural outcomes. However, this research has predominantly been undertaken with voluntary participants and practitioners who do not hold statutory powers. No research has explored the relationship between practitioner skill and client responses in child and family social work practice. The current study employed an exploratory sequential mixed-methods design and involved three interrelated stages of research. It utilised a dataset of recordings of conversations between social workers and parents/carers, collected as part of a large-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT) (Forrester et al. 2018; 2019). The first stage involved thematically analysing a subset of recordings in order to develop a context specific definition of “change talk” and identify other potential indicators of parent/carer motivation. This fed into the development of an observational behaviour coding tool which was used in the second phase of the study to collect data on three in-session parent/carer indicators of motivation. Data were statistically analysed for correlations between social worker MI skills and parent/carer responses. Finally, an emergent strand was added which involved categorising the focus of conversations in order to offer a description of the wider dataset and provide context for the findings of the main analysis. The findings indicate that there is an association between social worker MI skills and parent/carer motivation for change. However, the skills that proved most important were not “traditional” MI skills but those associated with the use of “good authority” which were MI informed but specific to statutory child and family social work. Furthermore, analysis of the wider dataset indicates that a high proportion of social work conversations do not focus on change, and that there were missed opportunities to do so. The findings draw attention to important differences between change processes in therapeutic contexts and that of statutory social work. It is hoped that these findings will influence social work education and training, both in terms of how MI training is delivered but also in relation to the communication skills that are taught and privileged more broadly.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	Social Sciences (Includes Criminology and Education)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	2 September 2024
Last Modified:	02 Sep 2024 08:32
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/171681

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