THE uuMiuu.i oaot ur auuiai. PRACTICE
work, whose members must be able to deal with intricate social situations, cannot—and will not—attain its full strength and become a fully functioning profession until its members can identify their area of central concern and define the nature of the problems, situations, and social phenomena with which their helping process and professional actions are concerned. Further, change and complexity in the area of social relationships today make it harder for social work to do this than other professions that deal with older and more easily understood areas of human need or function, such as health, education, and law.
The helping process in social work, which demands the capacity to influence social behavior and social conditions, depends upon adequate understanding 01 their nature. The practitioner must command and use relevant knowledge. The building of sue':, a body of professional knowledge requires identification of the particular phenomena with which the profession deals and concepts for organizing thinking regarding these phenomena. For a profession like social work to be effective in today's society, it must identify an area of central concern that is (1) common to the profession as a whole, (2) meaningful in terms of the professions values and goals, (3) practical in terms o: available and attainable knowledge and techniques, and (4) sufficiently distinctive so thai it does not duplicate what other professions are doing. To do this demands resdiness to work as intensively on understanding social phenomena and social situations as on understanding processes, methods, and action. It calls for the kind of integrative thinking that will draw from social work's past the ideas that are relevant, combine them with new ideas, and build the essential components into powerful, comprehensive concepts regarding the profession s focus, which will demonstrate convincingly to its members and to society where the profession stands and what it has to offer
Early Concepts
If asked to describe their profession, most social workers would probably emphasize two central ideas: (1) it is a helping profession and (2) it is concerned with the social functioning of people. What is meant by the notion of a helping profession? It is a profession that brings services to people, with the aim of modifying
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONING
situations to improve the welfare of individuals and society. Thus it is change oriented. Since change involves doing something about a situation, the professional worker is a participant in the change process. The social worker who helps a client change his attitudes or a group of agencies to co-ordinate their services is necessarily a part of the situation as long as the change process is going on. Each service profession gives special meaning to the idea of helping according to its own perspective, particularly its values and ways of working with people.
What, then, is added by the notion that social workers offer help in the area of social functioning? Obviously no one profession can claim this as its exclusive domain because it is too broad. Understandably, others are already moving in to stake their claim. If the idea of social functioning is to be used as a starting point, it must be defined further. As now used in social work, the idea is too vague and is being used with too many varied meanings.
Throughout most of its history, social work has had no central concept to describe its area of responsibility and expertise. Some social workers have stressed their concern with social problems, others with the skilled process. Still others have concentrated on a particular field of practice, such as family welfare, health, or corrections. In spite of these apparently varied interests, certain consistent and cumulative trends in thinking can be traced.
In earlier days social workers were concerned equally with problems of individuals and population groups. One interest took the form of social casework and the other resembled what is now called "social action." Although the thirties and forties showed a marked swing toward service to individuals, the interest in broader social conditions and problems calling for social work's concern was never lost and reappeared strongly toward the midcentury, restoring the old balance. Furthermore, in their literature, practice, and teaching, social workers characteristically perceived the individual as a person functioning in a social situation. Even though the concepts developed in social casework centered on personality, social workers never gave up their concern for the environment and its impact on the individual. The term "psychosocial" was increasingly used to describe the social work focus.1
1 See the following references in Cora Kasius, ed'., Social Casework in the Fifties (New York: Family Service Association ot America, 1962):
gg THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
Certainly it may be said that for a considerable period interest centered on the psychic aspects, the significance of the social environment was devalued, and a serious effort to bring the "psychic" and the "social" together was not made. Yet in spite of its ambivalence, the young profession persisted in asserting its continuous interest in both the person and his environment and recognizing that to fullfiil its purpose as a helping profession it must eventually eome to grips with the whole person-in-situation phenomenon, in all its facets and with all its implications.
Regrettably, early efforts at such conceptualization were not picked up and used. In her discussion of social evidence. Richmond placed the client in his family and neighborhood and suggested the key questions relevant to a number of typical social situations, such as the immigrant family and the widow with children.2 This part of her thinking, however, was lost to casework teaching and theory when psychotherapy claimed primary interest.
In 1935 Cannon presented an interpretation of the social work focus that is equally relevant more than thirty years later. She said:
No longer in the mind of the social case worker is poverty a sort of moral failure or even a disease of personality; it is a discrepancy between individual capacity and environmental demand upon it. No longer is rehabilitation of the dependent the social case worker's concept of cure, but rather the restoration of balance by strengthening environmental support on the one hand and releasing resident energies in the individual on the other.8
In 1937 Sheffield suggested that the unit with which social casework deals should be the "need situation." as defined by a "so-
Gordon Hamilton, "The Role of Social Casework in Social Policy," pp. 33 and 43, and Samuel Firestone, "The Scientific Component in the Casework Field Curriculum," pp. 315-310. Set also Isabel L. Siamm. "Ego Psychology in the Emerging Theoretical B?.se of Casework," in Alfred J. Kahn, ed., Issue; in American Socio! Work (New York: Columbia University Press, 1958), pp. 84-S7.
sMary E. Richmond, Social Diagnosis (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1917).
5 M. Antoinette Cannon, "Where the Changes in Social Case Work Have Brought Us," in Fern Lowry, ed., Readings in Social Case Work: 1920-1938 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1939), p. 112.
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONING 89
cially developing purpose." i Thus the concepts of environment and situation keep appearing in the literature.
In 1946 Pray carried on with the theme. Social work comes into play, he said, when familiar, satisfying social relationships are threatened, weakened, and broken and when people seek help in finding more meaningful relationships or in replem^hing their strength for meeting the difficulties and "realizing the potentialities of their social situations." Other professions are also interested in the individual but. unlike the others, social work is never primarily concerned with the separate, inner personal life but always with the individual in his social relationships.5 By this time there was greater readiness for such thinking and Fray's formulation was widely used.
In 1951 Hamilton, on the opening page of her well-known text on social casework, spoke of two nuclear ideas that distinguish social work as one of the humanistic professions. "The first," she said, "is that the human event consists of person and situation, or subjective and objective reality, which constantly interact." 6 This idea of person and situation interacting is elaborated throughout her book.
In 1958 the Working Definition described the practitioners concern with the interaction between the individual and the social environment but did not develop the concept further. It was Boelim who, in discussing the nature of social work, formally presented the concept of social functioning, which was being used at that time, and clarified its meaning by relating it to social interaction. The primary focus of social work is on social interaction, he pointed out. The individual and his environment should not be viewed as two separate entities but as an interactional field. In explaning this further, he said:
The nature of any problem in the area of social interaction is determined both by the individual's potential capacity for
< Ada Eliot Sheffield, Social Insight in Case Situations (New York: D. Appleton-Cemmy Co., 1937';. pp. 96-97.
' Kenneth L. M. Pray, Social Work in a Revolutionary Age (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 19491, pp. 236-237.
1 Gordon Hamilton, Theory and Practice of Social Case Work (New York: Columbia University Press, 1951), p. 3.
90 THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
relationships in performance of his social roles and by the social resources he uses to satisfy his needs for self-fulfillment. Hence, the social worker focuses at one and the same time upon the capacity of individuals and groups for effective interaction and upon social resources from the point of view of their contribution to effective social functioning. In the light of this dual focus the social worker initiates (alone or with related professional or nonprofessional community groups) steps (1) to increase the effectiveness of individuals' interaction with each other, singly, and in groups; and (2) to mobilize appropriate social resources by coordinating, changing, or creating them anew.7
Boehnfs interpretation was first published concurrently with the Working Definition and later included in the Social Work Curriculum Study of the Council on Social Work Education in 1959.8 His interpretation of social functioning in terms of role performance, a conceptual approach used by many social workers, is not pursued in this discussion because other concepts that appeared later seem more promising for social work.
An Example from One Field
Meanwhile other streams of thinking—not recognized as significant at the time—were gathering and flowing together. One of these began in one of the oldest fields of practice, medical social work. Early in this century social workers were drawn into hospitals and clinics by socially minded physicians. This field of practice was based upon a large scientific body of knowledge, centering around the reality problems of illness and medical care, which have a sharp disruptive impact on individuals and families. The physicians, accustomed to scientific thinking and orderly processes in dealing with patients, encouraged social workers to examine and clarify their own practice. A pioneer study, published when medi-
' Werner W. Boehm, Objectives of the Social Work Curriculum of the Future (New York: Council on Social Work Education, 1959), pp. 47—48.
8 See Werner W. Boehm, "The Nature of Social Work," Social Work, Vol. 3, No. 2 (April 1958), pp. 10-18; and ibid.
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONING Q\
cal social work was just fifteen years old, was significant because it began with the central phenomenon—that of illness—and described it from a social work viewpoint. In this study and one that followed later. Thornton identified the hospital social worker's concern as those "social conditions which bear directly on the health of the patient, either inducing susceptibility to ill-health, or helping or hindering the securing and completing of medical care." * Social problems created by the illness for other members of the family were also included. This concept, which was later defined as the social component in illness and medical care, encompassed factors in the personality as well as the environment. Thus from the beginning there was recognition of social workers' responsibility to apply their own thinking to their area of practice and to conceptualize the central problem in social work terms.
As psychiatric thinking spread through social work and psychosomatic medicine developed, the term "social component" was less used, but the basic concept persisted. At this stage the meaning of illness to the patient and family was particularly emphasized. Beginning in the thirties, a considerable literature dealing with the psychosocial aspects of illness developed. In these discussions, social workers clearly identified with the patients and families and endeavored to understand the impact of illness on them, their feelings about it, their difficulties with medical care, and their responses to the situation. The concepts of stress in psychosomatic medicine, prevention in public, health, and disability in rehabilitation, al! contributed to this thinking.'-0
By the early fifties considerable progress had been made. Starting from the original concept cf disease, social workers had moved a long way toward a concept of the psychosocial implications of
'The Functions of Hospital Social Service (Chicago: American Association of Hospital Social Workers, 1950), p. 59; and Janet Thornton, The Social Component in Medical Care (New York: Columbia University Press, 1937).
10 Some representative papers are Irene Gram, "Social Work with Tuberculous Patients," The Family, Vol. 13. No. 6 (October 19321, pp. 190-197; Ethel Cohen. ''The Social Component in Heart Disease," American Heart Journal Vol. 16, No. 4 (October 1938), pp. 422-430; Alice A. Grant, "Medical Social Work in an Epidemic of Poliomyelitis," Journal of Pediatrics, Vol. 24, No. 6 (June 1*44). pp. 691-723; and Caroline H. Elledge, "The Meaning of Illness." Medical Social Work, Vol. 2. No. 2 (April 1953), pp. 49-65.
92 THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
illness as perceived by social work. There were factors in the situation, however, that were limiting further progress. In working on the various medical services in the hospital, social workers be-came familiar with one or another medical condition, observed tic psychosocial problems presented to patients, and set out to describe them. Working in continuous collaboration with physicians as they did. it was natural to start from the medical condition. After a while, however, it began to appear that some of the problems described as characteristic of one condition were also round to be associated with other conditions. There was increasing overlapping and duplication of ideas. What was happening was that social workers, writing about medical problems in this way, were still under the influence of the medical frame of reference. It was pointed out in Chapter 2 that social work was growing through its fields. Here it seemed that the growth had gone as far as possible within the field. How then could the necessary steps be taken to break through and move clearly into a social work frame of reference?
If we re-examine this stream of thinking about the psychosocial aspects of illness, we can see that it was steadily moving toward a concept of social functioning as related to illness. But a social work concept was needed that couid be applied to any field. When the medical social workers found themselves hemmed in within the medical frame of reference, the idea of social functioning was still too vague to be useful. Nevertheless, some progress toward such a concept was made. These social workers had cot allowed themselves to be confined by "casework."' "skill." and "setting," but had used a broader social work approach for understanding and describing the problems regarded as central to their practice. Their ideas encompassed both the personality and the environment. There was continuous concern for both the emotional aspects and the socioeconomic impact of illness on individual! and families.
In seeking to analyze and describe the problems presented to patients and their families by illness and medical care, social workers began to recognize recurrent experiences—such as mutilation of the body, physical helplessness, uncertainty of outlook, zao. fear of death—which presect difficulties for all persons who must go through them. Thus there began to be movement away from concentration on specific diseases (the medical approach) or on
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONIKC 93
unique reactions of individuals (the casework approach) toward identification of common psychosocial problems of illness viewed within a social work perspective.
Emerging Social Work Concepts
The next step-—to move from the confines of one particular field of practice toward the definition and use of basic social work concepts in any field of practice—has been facilitated by two directions of thinking that were stimulating to social workers. One was the conceptualization of human growth and development as the successive mastery of the particular problems presented to the individual by each new life cycle through which he passes. The second was the crisis concept, first formulated in mental health and further developed by social workers and behavioral scientists. Here, the problems presented by crucial life situations—whether the life cycles of individual growth or specific traumatic episodes like illness-—are conceived as tasks that must be met and dealt with in. some way. The aspect with which social workers are most concerned is repeatedly described as the coping efforts of people to deal with these tasks. A related concern is the consequences of crisis for people in terms of their opportunity for further growth." In examining these converging ideas further, we should have in mind liie requirements for such concepts, if they are to identify the focus of the profession. They should have high relevance and applicability to the essential elements of social work, particularly its values. They should concentrate on a few related phenomena to avoid diffuseness and yet be general enough to cover the range of phenomena found in social work practice. They should have theoretical interest so that they can stimulate research and be tested. They should move social work thinking toward greater integration.1-"
11 Ruth M. Butler, An Orientation to Knowledge of Human Growth and Behavior in Social Work Education (New York: Council on Social Work Education, 1959); and Howard J. Parad, ed., Crisis intervention: Selected ■ Readings (New Yorit: Family Service Association of America, 1965),
i; William E. Gordon, "Vncwiedge and Value: Their Distinction and Relationship in Clarifying Social Work Practice," Social Work. Vol. 10, No. 3 (July 1963), pp. .V.--39.
94 THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
It should be clear that we are not concerned here with method or intervention, agency programs, or the field of social welfare. These are. of course, all related matters. But we are at this point concentrating on the effort to identify social work's central focus— the problems, situations, and phenomena with which it is primarily concerned.
The Concept of Task
Taking the ideas that had been emerging from social work, we shall see how, used in combination with concepts from other professions, they led toward an integrative concept. The concept of life tasks is one of these.1* As has been shown, the idea that there are situations which present problems to groups of people and must be dealt with by them in some way began to develop rather early in social work. This was implicit in the concept of '•the social component in illness" as developed in medical social work. In 1940 the writer, in discussing the meaning of illness to the patient, described "recurrent situations in illness or medical cara that are difficult for many patients," such as entering the hospital or having some part of the body removed, and the manner in which the problem is revealed through the patient's difficulty in taking the necessary step in relation to his medical care.14 Social workers in other fields were exploring similar ideas, such as the meaning of money, family breakdown, and marital friction. They were not, however, able to move toward the kind of general concept needed for social work because of their concentration on the uniqueness of the individual and emotional aspects of behavior. It was the psychiatrists, because they also individualized patients but through their scientific medical training were accustomed to generalize, who pointed the way. Men like Lindemann and Bowlby recognized that there were life situations, such as bereavement and separation, which presented problems to most people, and that
-s In the social work literature the task concept is also used to refer to the professional task of the social worker. Here it is used only in relation to the people who are coping with life problems.
14 Harriett M. Bartlett, Some Aspects of Social Casework in a Medical Selling (Chicago: American Association of Social Workers, 1940), pp. 117 and 123.
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these situations could be described as psychosocial phenomena.16 In his discussion of ego identity, Erikson described what he called "psychosocial crises" at each maturational stage.16
It is not clear when the term "task" first came to be used in social work. Writers in psychiatry used such terms as "syndrome" and "crisis." Rapoport, a psychologist, in a study of the critical transition points in the normal family life cycle, such as getting married, described the "inherent tasks" and related them to the coping process.17 Austin, a social worker, also brought together the ideas of tasks and coping.13
The crisis model was originally developed in the mental health field and was concerned with the prevention of mental disorders. It directed attention primarily to emotional disturbances and psychological problems.19 At first, social workers tended to follow this lead, with an emphasis on ego psychology. They also discussed the task-crisis concept in terms of their customary methods framework and wrote about "short-term casework," "preventive casework," and "crisis intervention." 20 However, to develop the task concept effectively within a social work framework requires some shift in emphasis. Tasks refer to social phenomena, not techniques. The task is a way of describing critical and demanding situations that confront people. Social workers must be equally concerned with the psychic and social implications of situations for the functioning of people in their social relationships
lb Erich Lindemann, "Symptomatology and Management of Acute Grief," in Parad, ed., op. cit., pp. 7-21; and John Bowlby, Maternal Care and Menial Health (Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization, 1951).
"Erik H. Erikson, "The Problem of Ego Identity," in George S. Klein, ed., Psychological Issues (New York: International Universities Press, 1950), p. 166.
Rhona Rapoport, "Normal Crises, Family Structure, and Mental Health," in Parad, ed., op. cit., pp. 75-87.
1S Lucille N. Austin, Foreword, in Parad, ed., op. cit., p. xii.
19 See Gerald Caplan, "General Introduction and Overview," pp. 8-10, and Donald C. Klein and Erich Lindemann. "Preventive Intervention in Individual and Family Crisis Situations." pp. H3-305, in Caplan, ed., Prevention of Mental Disorders in Children (New York: Basic Books. 1961).
:" Parad, op. cit.
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THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONING
f '
—which is a somewhat different approach from that of psychiatrists.21
As used in social work, the task concept is a way of describing the demands made upon people by various life situations. These have to do with daily living, such as growing up in the family, learning in school, entering the world of work, marrying and rearing a family, and also with the common traumatic situations of life such as bereavement, separation, illness, or financial difficulties. These tasks call for responses in the form of attitude or action from the people involved in the situation. They arc common problems that confront many (or all) people. The responses may differ but most people must deal with the problems in some way or other. Thus progress in identifying the characteristics of such tasks will lead to better understanding of the problems that people face in their daily living.
The task concept is not a comprehensive theory like Erikson's theory of human maturation but a single concept referring to one aspect of psychosocial behavior with which social workers are concerned. Thinking about tasks leads to such questions as: What are the tasks presented to individuals and families in meeting the shock of serious illness, the attendant anxiety, and the permanent physical handicap that frequently results? 22 What task faces the delinquent in prison if he is to move from the restricted prison environment toward a responsible role in community life? Sometimes the steps to be taken in dealing with tasks are sequential, in that later steps depend on earlier ones. For example, the child must accept separation from home in order to attend school. The adult must give up the protection of the hospital or prison in order to carry family responsibilities.
Since the task concept directs attention to common problems and life situations that many people face, it cuts across old barriers which fragmented social work thinking. It is concerned with the nature of the situation to be dealt with rather than the social worker's skill and activity.   By centering interest on common
21 Elizabeth P. Rice, "Concepts of Prevention as Applied to the Practice of Social Work," American Journal of Public Health, Vol. 52, No. 2 (February 1962), pp. 266-274.
»Harriett M. Bartlett, Social Work Practice in the Health Field (New York: National Association of Social Workers, 1961). pp. 150-168.
(rather than unique) problems, it moves social work toward its area of central concern, away from the divisive thinking so frequently found in earlier days. It broadens the scope of thinking. For social work it is a new avenue to understanding human behavior and leads to developing new clusters of knowledge.23
The Concept oj Coping
The idea of task leads directly to the idea of coping. They go together. Having identified and described the nature of life tasks, we must then try to answer the question of how people actually deal with these tasks. Again, the concept is a broad one, having to do with typical patterns of response and action applicable to many people.
Social work thinking in general and casework in particular have directed attention to problems and problem-solving, with special concern for people who have difficulty in solving their problems of living. Because of the dependence on psychiatric theory, there has been an emphasis on emotional, irrational, and unconscious aspects of behavior, which frequently result in evasion and denial and thus temporary or prolonged avoidance of life tasks. In contrast, the emerging concept of coping now emphasizes the conscious, cognitive, and rational aspects of behavior also. In such behavior there is usually a direct engagement with the situation and coping can then be described as relative mastery of the tasks involved in the situation.-'4 It is recognized that most people will
o After the approach to the concept of social functioning presented in this chapter had been developed and formulated, the writer read a paper by Elliot Studt, "Social Work Theory and Implications for the Practice of Methods," Social Work Education Reporter, Vol. 16, No. 2 (June 1968). pp. 22-24 and 42-46, which discusses theory about social work practice derived from research done in a special correctional unit for young offenders. In her paper Studt presents concepts of tasks and situation, regarded as relevant for all social work practice, that have many points of similarity with those developed independently by the writer of this monograph.
« Lois Barclay Murphy and collaborators, The Widening World oj Childhood (New York: Basic Books, 1962); and Lydia Rapoport, "Crisis-Oriented Short-Term Casework," Social Service Review, Vol. 41. No. 1 (March 1967), pp. 39-10.
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THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK FRACTICE
suffer stress in dealing with the tasks but that some will be able to take the necessary steps without becoming excessively disturbed or disorganized. It is further recognized that other people fail in life tasks, not through any weakness in themselves, but through lack of opportunity to learn the appropriate behavior or essential social skills, that is, from not having had the kind of life experiences that would prepare them to take the necessary steps. The. Head Start projects, which provide such missing experiences for deprived preschool children, aim to fill this gap through direct teaching and learning in order to increase the coping capacity of the children when they move into formal education.25
When the demands of the environment are excessive in relation to the coping capacities of the people involved in the situation, then coping becomes ineffectual and the people become helpless and overwhelmed. Poverty, racial discrimination, lack of access to jobs, and other societal problems subject large segments of the population to stress, anxiety, deprivation, and alienation. Here, of course, major efforts for social change must be directed at the environment. In spite of the recognized inadequacy of peopled coping in such situations, social workers want to make sure that the people themselves have a part in the planning and action that affect their welfare so that they can maintain positive interaction with the social environment. As the pressures of the environment can be lessened, the coping efforts of the people can become more effective and successful.
Some social workers, recognizing the inadequacy of society's provisions for large groups in the population, might consider the concept of coping irrelevant because these people are helpless in dealing with their own situations. The concept is important, however, even in extreme situations, because it emphasizes a concern and respect for people's strivings toward attainment of their own potential, in line with social work's basic values. It underlines the importance of people's being active and sharing in planning for their own future. Lacking such a concept, social workers could again fall into the error that plagued the field in the early
25 These projects, developed as part of the federal antipoverty programs during the Johnson Administration, offer special opportunities and training to preschool children from deprived homes with the aim of preparing them better for entrance into school.
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99
days of casework, namely, that of doing jor people, which leads to manipulation and domination.
The manner in which these concepts of task and coping are being incorporated in practice is demonstrated by the writing of Silverman.  Describing services for the widowed during bereavement, she says: "The conceptual scheme by which most of us examine the problems of our clients leads us to seek the etiology of these problems in their early childhood experiences." The service that has been available—casework—is designed to help the client with his malfunctioning, which is viewed as a reflection of personality or interpersonal difficulties resulting from his psychosocial development.  She then goes on to analyze the experience of bereavement as a ''critical transition" with a beginning and end, between which the individual does "the work of the transition."  Traditionally, casework has emphasized the client's defensive behavior and emotional state.  To deal with these problems in terms of the individual's past adjustment. Silverman points out, will not be as effective as dealing with them as a stage in the transition that he will experience and with which—with time and mastery of the current situation—he will be able to cope.20 Silverman demonstrates  progress  from  casework's earlier emphasis on the psychogenetic history of the individual to a concern with current coping efforts directed toward hie tasks—what she calls "the work of the transition"—that are common to many or all people.   The change of focus allows social work thinking to move beyond the single idea of individualizing the client to generalizing about people's coping efforts, as in relation to widowhood, and thus toward a broader view of behavior.
A Conceut of Social Functioning jor Social Work
Now it is possible to return to the question raised at the beginning of this chapter regarding the central focus of social work as a profession.   The emerging concepts of task and coping are
2aFh>lIis Relic Silverman, "Services for the Widowed During the Period of Bereavement," Social Work Practice, 1966 (New York: Columbia University Fress, 1966), pp. I?0 and 177,
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THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
useful in suggesting a comprehensive concept to identify the professional focus. Coping refers to people's actions in striving to meet and actually deal with situations that may be variously conceived as social tasks, life situations, or problems of Irving. People experience these life tasks primarily as pressures from their social environment.2' Two major ideas come out of this: people coping, on the one hand, and environmental demands, on the other. To become parts of a single comprehensive concept, these ideas must be brought together within the same dimension and it is the idea of social interaction that the writer flunks accomplishes this.-6
Social workers are concerned both with people's opportunity to grow and with obstacles to attainment of full potential. Thus in considering the interaction between people and environment, they must bear in mind the consequences of this interaction for people's growth.   Are the environmental demands excessive?
" The idea of task has been useful in freeing social workers from old limitations of thinking but is not in itself broad enough to become a major term in a central social work concept. It continues to be needed, however, as a subeoucept for clarifying the nature of environmental demands.
:s William E. Gordon took the first step in linking "coping capacity" and "environmental demand" within a single concept through the idea of "match or mismatch" between capacity or demand, in a memo to the Experimental Field Instruction star;, George Warren Brown School of Social Work, Washington University, St Lanis. Missouri, December 4, 1963. Previously, other aspects of social functioning had been emphasized, as shown by J. O. Jacques Alary, in B meaning analysis of the expression "social functioning" as a social work concept, which he reported in J968. In an analysis of 416 statements concerning social functioning, appearing in 1S2 articles published in Sccia! Work and Social Casework between 1956 and 1967, he found that the dominant tendency was to conceptualize social functioning at a low level of abstraction and to use it to designate a behavioral phenomenon. The individual human person is the most frequent system to which "social functioning" is ascribed as B property. Environmental factors identified as having some influence on the social functioning of individuals are designated by terms that lack determinacy of meaning. The nature of the qualifiers used suggests that social functioning corresponds most often to a clinical entity whose manifestations are to be diagnosed and evaluated. Only a few qualifiers suggested other dirneii sions. See J. O. Jacques Alary. "A Meaning Analysis of the Expression 'Social Functioning' as a Social Work Concept." pp. 106-107. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Tulane Lhtiversity, December 1967.
focus on social functioning
Are people's coping capacities inadequate? If there is imbalance, how can the balance be improved? Since we are concerned with growth and potential, which imply ongoing change, it is important that any balance attained, at any particular time, should not be rigid but flexible.2* The consequences of early coping efforts may enable people to enlarge their efforts and so improve their coping that they succeed in meeting the environmental demands. On the other hand, if coping efforts are persistently inadequate, disorganization may ensue and the people may become overwhelmed by the situation.
Examination cf the Concept
How does such a central concept for social work meet the requirements set forth earlier? This interpretation of social functioning has the possibility of providing what social work has never had—a concept broad enough to encompass the profession's scope and yet clear enough to provide a focus that will stimulate integrated thinking and effort. It is a positive way of limiting the profession's area of interest without having to set outer boundaries and is a way of defining what social work is that is sufficiently open ended io allow for further development.
The essential ideas in this comprehensive concept describing the profession's focus are, at the most abstract level, the interaction of people and environment.   They can be expressed thus:
•J: ion
-» Environment
So expressed, the concept is too impersonal for a service profession like social work, which is concerned with helping people to deal with their life situations in various ways. To accomplish their goal, social workers must understand the meaning of the situations to the people involved in them.   Thus to be more
38 See the use of the idea of balance by M. Antoinette Cannon as quoted on page 88, and also by Margaret L. Schutz, "Report of the Field Instruction Experimental Project of the George Warren Brown School of Social Work," pp. 3-4, Paper presented at the Annual Program Meeting, Council on Social Work Education, New York, New York, January 1966. (Mimeographed.)
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the common base of social work practice
suitable for social work, the concept may be elaborated and expressed thus:
People Coping
Exchange Balance
These ideas bring together several basic themes for the profession's focus. If the concept is to be genuinely integrative for the profession, it must be comprehensive. Until now most of the social work discussion of social functioning has centered around individuals and families.50 In this monograph the suggested concept is extended to refer to "people" (whether as individuals or as groups) in order to cover social work practice more fully,81
To be comprehensive, the concept must also tie social work's central concerns more closely together. It was the failure to bring the ideas of people and environment together and hold them there that produced such a long lag in social work thinking. In the past there was a hiatus between the idea of the person and the idea of environment that blocked integrative thinking about the profession's focus. In individual situations, for instance, social workers talked of using ego psychology on the one side and knowledge of community resources on the other; but they are of different dimensions. We make progress in closing the gap when the interaction between people and environment is perceived as an active exchange. Often intensive effort will be required to identify the nature of the exchange between people and environment that is crucial in the particular situation.   Having obtained
50 Alary, op. cit.
81 After this chapter was written, the writer found a paper by Marjorie M. McQueen, "The Role of the Social Worker in the Remediation of Children with 'Learning Disabilities,'" Patterns for Innovative Practice: School Social Work Conference (La Grange, Hi.: School Social Work Conference. 1967), pp. 59-68. In this paper McQueen presents a conceptual and diagrammatic analysis of social work practice based on people coping with environmental demands, which has many similarities to that presented here. Since she indicates that she is incorporating the thinking of Gordon and Bartlett, particularly from the writer's paper—"Characteristics of Social Work," Building Social Work Knowledge: Report of a Conference (New-York: National Association of Social Workers, 1965)—it is not unexpected to find that our thinking should come together in this way.
FOCUS ON SOCIAL FUNCTIONING 103
such understanding, die social worker can then move to improve the balance between the people's coping efforts and the environmental demands. This may be done by working with people or environment but most frequently with both and always with concern for the interaction between them. It should be remembered that the ultimate goal of all this social work activity is the growth of the individual.
Several theoretical concepts are relevant and important for the refinement of this concept of social functioning.   The idea of balance between the demands of the environment and the coping efforts of people is related to the concept of homeostasis, which was developed by Cannon and others to describe the maintenance of a steady state in the internal environment of the human body, through adjustment to various inner and outer threatening events.33 This steady state is essential for the growth of the human organism, since sudden changes beyond the capacity of the system for self-regulation are disruptive, as has been shown in studies of stress.33 Similarly in our concept of social functioning, if there is imbalance in the people-environment exchange, stress may result for people, environment, or both.
The interaction of people with their social environment may also be perceived as an open-ended social system. Thus social workers interested in systems theory can explore its contribution to the development of the social functioning concept. Since social workers are concerned with the consequences of interaction, the idea of feedback from systems theory is useful. In presenting systems theory for social workers, Hearn quotes Wiener's statement that "feedback is the property of being able to adjust future conduct by past performance." It may be used not only to regulate specific movements but also wider aspects of behavior.31
"Walter B. Cannon, The Wisdom of the Body (2d ed.; New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1939).
'sHans Selye, The Stress of Life (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1956).
Si Norbert Wiener, The Human Use of Human Beings (New York: Doubleday & Co., Anchor Books, 1954), p. 33, as quoted in Gordon Heam, Theory Building in Social Work (Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto Press, 195S), p. 47. In relation to social systems theory for social work, see also Gordon Hearn, ed., The General Systems Approach: Contributions Toward an Holistic Conception of Social Work (New York: Council on Social Work Education, 1969).
104
the common' hase of social work practice
Thus when people are coping wiih environmental demands, the feedback from this exchange may cause them to respond with increased effort, discovery of new resources, and such improvement of their coping that they succeed in meeting the demands and develop their own potential at the same time. On the other hand, if the feedback is negative, if people lack the means to respond, they may fail and be worse off than ever. The same may be true of the environment, which also responds to positive or negative feedback from the exchange. The essential point here is that encounters between people and environment leave both changed, and people and environments that lack restorative capacity may be adversely affected.35
Because the idea of social functioning is being widely used at present to refer to the central area of social work's concern, this term is being used here. It has been used with various meanings inside and outside social work. At one extreme it is used in a broad sense to describe wide areas of human behavior and extensive social phenomena with which many professions and disciplines are concerned. In social work it is frequently used to refer to the functioning of people in their social roles and relationships, with varying emphasis on their relation to the environment.30 The gain made in the new concept suggested here is that it focuses not on the behavior of people, but on the exchanges between them and their environment, thus becoming a more dv-namic concept with greater potential and power.
The Environmental Component
This concept of social functioning requires that social workers should be more concerned than they have been in the past with
ss William E. Gordon, "Basic Constructs for an Integrative and Generative Conception of Social Work, in Hearn, ed., op. cit., p. 8.
38 It is the writer's opinion that the use of such a central concept to describe the profession's central focus would be a great advance in clarification and movement toward integrative thinking. If experience shows that the term "social functioning" cannot be used without continually reverting to earlier or narrower meanings, it may be better to use some new term. In the end, the term is less important than the ideas. Rather than arguing over "what is meant by social functioning," it will be more profitable to push toward new integrative concepts suitable for defining the social work focus.
focus on soclal functioning
105
the social environment as an entity to be understood and dealt with. Traditionally, knowledge about personality and group process has claimed greater attention than the environment. The manner in which the social environment operates to bring pressures upon people needs to be better understood. This is not the same thing as obtaining general knowledge about social conditions and social problems or knowledge that will enable social workers themselves to operate in the power structure. To be brought within the concept of social functioning, this knowledge must analyze and clarify the impact of the social environment on people, whether as individuals, groups, or communities. If coping efforts are to become effective, the nature of the pressures, stresses, and tasks must be better understood.
Furthermore, social workers must concern themselves with the people who comprise the environment because the consequences of social functioning affect them too.   To some degree, social workers have extended their helping efforts to include others in the environment, as in extending help to the client's family. There has also been awareness that excessive concentration on the needs of clients could lead to the breakdown of others in the situation. What is now involved is a much more extensive phenomenon, namely, that changes brought about in the balance between the coping efforts of a group and the demands of their social environment can at times operate in such a way as to be seriously dysfunctional for some or all of the people in that environment. When low-income families were brought into housing projects, the purpose was to improve their living conditions.   Only later was it recognized that when a considerable number of disorganized families were introduced into a project, their interaction with more stable families could initiate a process of deterioration extending throughout the project, thus creating a new and larger problem. The concept of social functioning calls for knowledge about and concern for the welfare of persons on both sides of the interaction.
In assessing the demands of the environment, it will also be necessary to identify the supports that it gives to the coping efforts of people. Social workers commonly think of these supports in terms of community resources and social welfare programs. The fact that social workers know these community resources and how to mobilize them is frequently mentioned as a major aspect
114
the common base of social work practice
other professions and disciplines of what the problems mean to people and the nature of their coping efforts. Such potential knowledge—for example, that relating to a public welfare system which incorporates an attitude of blaming recipients for their predicament and thus regards them as unworthy of respect—is timely, even urgently needed, in today's society. Better recognition of the profession's focus and the process of knowledge-building will permit the designing of projects through which the knowledge imbedded in practice can be obtained and tested.
Thus definition of a comprehensive concept of social functioning will stimulate and promote the development of social work's characteristic knowledge derived from its past and future experience. It will also facilitate and guide the selection and use of generalizations from other professions and disciplines that are relevant for social work. Both types of knowledge can then be incorporated into the profession's common body of knowledge in a planned and orderly manner not possible before.
TJnintegrated Segments oj Knowledge
A clarified focus will not only contribute to building the central body of knowledge but also make possible the bringing together of segments of new knowledge previously isolated from each other in various areas of the profession's practice. In the discussion of the fields in the opening chapter, it was pointed out how social workers in the early days of the profession perceived the central problem of their concern to be the one specific to their area of practice, such as health or child welfare. As the movement to develop a description of die social work focus gains momentum, practitioners will perceive themselves as social workers first and only second as workers in one or another field of practice. This change in perception moves the overall concept of social mnctioning to the forefront and gives it priority. When this occurs, social workers will perceive the situations with which they deal first as manifestations of social functioning and only secondarily as falling into particular types of social functioning, such as family problems or correctional problems. Knowledge-needed in the various fields of practice can be brought together under one frame of reference, that is, social work. What is relevant
focus o.n social functioning 1 ,
for all social workers then can flow into social works general bod, of knowledge and what is specific to the fiel/r ' specialized knowledge. lemam M
Another segment social work knowledge is the kind that ha* become submerged in the three- methods    \M crri9, knowledge about individuals S Deea
is related >o tb»V .T '. SrCJps' aUd the community that is rented to their social functioning but not limited to particular arrive measures. In the same way that knowledg^SS to the Leids or practice became tied to a specific field the knowf
and available wlSin the LZS2I   TTt T "T* * M Further refinement of cri£ for s e! Z«      5' ? their annlTMrirm „-:n selection and experimentation in
men* application will, or course, be required    a- t clarified riwm wffl u (i      - reqrurea.    As the locus is
•fv ;•■ « ihc navantage that instead of being hidden
wohin fields and methods, new knowledge can find L ™ place in the growing body of knowlJl- k,, aPPWpnate profession.   ~ 7     *R™kd& «*««*mg to the whole
A third segment or umntegrated social work knowledge has to do with a wide range of activities that arc related but supplementary to professional social work practice. Undoubted sodal workers need to know a great deal about foster homes, SuS centers, homemakers, nursing homes, and other such Z^-quite possibly more knowledge is available in the literature about diese phases or practice than about the central area of soda! "uuc ttorung. Some people propose to build scdal work collecting and cooing all that « now formulated. A basic romt of tuts discussion is, however, that the effective organization a,d use o such supplementary knowledge depends upon the clarification of the profession's central focus. Priority should be give, to estab-hshing and encouraging a continuous effort to build social work knowledge at its center, since ail the rest depends on achievina progress there. ~ ' 6
The Social Functioning Concept: A Recapitulation
Because the suggested concept of social functioning represents a somewhat unfamiliar approach, it seems well to restate the main
116
the common base of social work practice
outlines of the proposition at this point. The concept rests on the general idea of interaction between people and environment. To make it suitable for social work, it is further refined and focused on the relation between the coping activity of people and the demands of environment. Many earlier interpretatious of social functioning centered on the functioning of individuals or groups, that is. on behavior. This concept differs in that attention is now-directed primarily to what goes on between people and environment through the exchange between them. This dual focus ties them together. Thus person and situation, people and environment, are encompassed in a single concept, which requires that they be constantly viewed together.
The interaction between coping efforts and environmental demands can be regarded as a field of multiple interweaving actions. What the social worker wants to understand particularly for dealing with the situation is the balance (or, as Gordon says, the ''matching'') between coping and demands. Here we are concerned not with crude activities but with their interrelationships irt order to understand further their consequences for the growth of people and the amelioration of their environment. We do not yet have concepts to describe the nature of this exchange and balance, that is, what passes between people and their environment. What is going on is not "exchanging behavior" but something more vital and significant for people's growth. It is of a different order than behavior or activity and requires understanding of the changes that result from them.
Some of the questions and concerns regarding such an exchange might be the following: Is effective communication going on between people and their environment or is it being blocked? Is the transmission of feelings—whether aggressive or hostile, supportive or stimulating-—the most significant aspect and what are the consequences of such a transmission? Does the exchange lead to the disorganization of people, the environment, or both? Does it involve a kind of participation that is growth producing for the people and perhaps equally positive and stimulating on both sides cf the exchange? We need more refined concepts that will enable us to get at what is significant for human growth, in these exchanges and in the balance or imbalance thai results.
As was pointed out previously, the first step must be to understand the coping patterns, environmental demands, various kinds
focus on social
FUNCTIONING
117
of exchange and balance, and their consequences, through rigorous study of situations and use of the growing body of knowledge. In this development and use of the social functioning concept, knowledge and values are to be kept separate and the concept's primary base is in knowledge.
As tliis knowledge grows, social work's goal of maximum realization for every individual will rest more firmly on knowledge and be better related to practice. Since the means for furthering this goal now involve many ways of working through ether channels than working directly with the individual—as with neighborhood groups, social programs, and social policy—it is important to keep always in mind that it is the growth of individuals with which all this larger effort is ultimately concerned. That is, social workers in their intervention hope to influence the balance in the relationship between coping activity and environmental demands in order to further individual growth as well as ameliorate the environment.
The concept of social functioning, which has been growing and changing over several decades in social work practice, has not yet developed its full potential for defining the profession's focus. If it can be thought of as more, than the behavior of individual! and can be extended to include their active and exchanging relationship with their environment aioug with the feedback and consequences to both flowing from that active relationship, more of its promise may be realized.13
In conclusion, in the preceding discussion a number of emerging ideas were identified and brought together in a concept of social functioning that lias potential for clarifying the central focus of the profession. Hamilton pointed out that the strength of social work lies in its ability "to operate st both ends of the psychosocial event." in its refusal to limit itself to cither external factors or internal factors alone.44 The suggested concept of social functioning unites the "psychic" and the "social," as social work view-s them. If developed further, it could provide a much-needed anchor point for the profession.
43 See Gordon. "Basic Constructs for an r„«__,-        . „
Conception Of Social Work." Integrative and Generative
"Hamilton. "The Ro's of Social i   ■    „   ■ ,
LI MC1« Casework in Social Policy," p. 33.
146
the common base of social work practice
will have competence in at least one type of intervention and if he is an experienced worker, probably at least initial competence in several others. If the situation he faces is in an early stage of development, he may decide to offer consultation at first, with the aim of drawing in other social workers possessing die necessary competence at a later date.
Having made the necessary decisions, the social worker moves into the action to which this whole process of assessment has been directed. The assessment may be telescoped into a brief period or greatly extended. As has been pointed out, it is shared with others in the situation and interwoven with interventive action as situations evolve. In social work, as in other professions, assessment can only be effective if it is recognized by the practitioner as a conscious intellectual process, to be carried on deliberately, responsibly, and expertly.
Professional Foundation for Assessment
We can now see why the efforts in preceding chapters to define and describe the profession's focus and primary orientation, along with its process of knowledge-building, are relevant for the use of professional judgment in assessment. It seems probable that the quality of assessment required to deal with the complex problems of today's society can only be attained when the conditions for its operation are built into the professional base.
Stages in Assessment
The whole purpose of assessment is to enable social workers to gain sufficient understanding so that they can bring about social change effectively in particular situations which confront them as social workers. This requires a well-grounded definition of the social work contribution in each situation. Three stages of assessment that are of particular importance in this ongoing intellectual process are concerned with the following: (1) the common base of social work practice, (2) viewing social situations, and (3) the
PROFESSIONAL JUDGMENT IN ASSESSMENT 147 decision regarding social work intervention.8 These approaches to social work practice were first developed by the writer in connection with an analysis of practice in specific fields." They have influenced the total thinking in this monograph and will be used at this point to discuss social work assessment.
The diagram on page 148 suggests the main outlines of these stages in assessment and their relation to each other. The suggested stages do not cover all the essential steps in assessment. They have been selected because they appear to be of special importance as social work practice moves from the traditional diagnosis within particular' methods toward the broader type of assessment now required.
In order to understand how such professional guides to assessment may operate, we will assume that they are being used by experienced social workers, aware of the full scope of social work practice and possessing mastery1 of its essentials. These social workers are not confined to operating in terms of any particular agency or field but are guided primarily by professional principles. From this position thev are prepared to view the wide range of situations with which they and their profession must deal.
Harting Point; The Com
The first stage covers the common base of social work practice, which now iucludcs no', only the essential elements (values, knowledge, and interventive techniques) as identified in the "Working Definition of Social Work Practice." but also the focus on social functioning and the. orientation toward the people with the problem, as developed in Chapters ó and 7. The assumption is thai all social workers will stan from this common base in making assessments.   This is, in fact, what makes them social workers.
3 Here stage is taker, to mean "a period or step in a process, activity, or development." See Webster's Third New International Dictionary (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam Co., 1961), p. 2219.
8 Harriett M. Bartiett, Analyzing Social Work Practice by Fields iNew York: National Association of Social Workers, 1961). pp. 18-19.
PROFESSIONAL JUDGMENT IK ASSESSMENT
149
FIGURE 3. STAGES IN ASSESSMENT OF SOCIAL SITUATIONS
The Common Base of Social Work Practice
Focus on social functioning
Orientation to the people with the problem
Value Knowledge Interventive repertoire
Characteristics of Social Situations
Responses and behavior .     r        f Demands and supports
Problems (conditions) « f
- oeoole involved m tne
nmHem the environment
-aUC;l—Ä as indicated by the nature of various social situations.)
Use of the Common Base of Social Work Practice for
Assessment of Social Situations Leading to Decisions on Interventive Action
Guided by such perceptions. rJ! social workers should now be able to start from this base in assessing social situations and move toward the more specific, specialized, and partial aspects of their practice relevant to the situations they face. This is, in one sense, a reversal of the traditional social work approach which so emphasized the uniqueness of each individual or situation and the methodological differences that it provided no effective way for social workers to identify what was common in their practice.
With progress toward a common base, social workers need no longer operate with so many hidden assumptions regarding their practice. They can more readily perceive and use what is common and what is specific in relation to each other. However, such fundamental changes in perceptions take time. Until such time as all social workers recognize the common elements in practice and operate easily and naturally on the common base, we must keep reminding ourselves that assessment starts consciously and deliberately from this base.
Viev;ing Social Situations from the Social Work Base
A second stage covers the characteristics of social situations as viewed from the common base of social work practice. This is taken to mean viewing and seeking to understand specific social, situations before there is substantial social work intervention or effort to change the situation. The way that social workers view specific situations with which they must deal obviously represents a crucial step from the common base toward the decision regarding
. interventive action._The word "situation" is used here in the
sense of a particular complex of affairs or circumstances thai confronts one social worker, a group of social workers, or the whole profession and must be assessed by them. It is used to cover the full range of such circumstances, from the individual to the whole field of practice.10 The attempt to consider within one perspective the full range of situations with which social
" At this period in the development of social work practice, it seems preferable to use a general term like situation without any effort to give it a distinctive social work meaning. A term is needed that will cover practice without fragmenting it. See Werner \V. Boehm, "Toward New Models of Social Work Practice," Social Work Practice, 196J vNew York: Colum-
150 THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
workers are concerned is new and unfamiliar. However, it must be attempted because the need for such a:i advance is urgent.
Basic concepts. The basic concepts of social work guide the practitioner's initial view of social situations, as is shown in the diagram on page 14S. The primary social work orientation toward people and their needs leads to the question: What people are involved here? Are we concerned widi individuals and families in their relationships with others? with smali groups of people in neighborhoods? with large population groups? If the social worker is a social planner dealing with agencies and programs, he must still ask what people they are serving. The next question relates to the needs of the people, that is: What problem or condition is central in this situation? Is there one major problem such as health or the provision of community services? Otis there a complex of undefined, interrelated problems?
Social situations do not in themselves reveal which of their characteristics are important for social workers. Lacking a clear concept of the profession's focus in the past, social workers had to use such guides for assessment as were available in the various segments of practice. That is why integrative concepts, such as that of social functioning, are now so important. Following this concept, basic questions can be asked regarding the responses of the people in the situation. What is the impact of the situation on them? What is its meaning to them? How arc they coping with it? At the same time that the people's responses are being considered, the demands and supports of tile environment are also being examined. What are the positive opportunities for people in the community? What are the most serious limitations? What social groups and institutions are dominant and how do they operate? What agencies, programs, and services are involved? What knowledge and techniques, what economic resources 3re available to deal with the situation? What sociocuhural attitudes are of particular significance?  The concept of social functioning
bia University Press, 1967), pp. 3-18, in which he suggests a somewhat similar but more restricted use of the concept of situation. One distinction in terminology is to be noted. These are specific situations with which social workers deal in their daily work, usually called "cases" or "problems." They are to be distinguished from the "life situations" associated with the concepts of task and copir.g discussed in Chapter 6.
professional judgment in assessment 151
leads to a disciplined analysis of all these factors through an examination of the coping patterns of the people, the demands and supports of the environment, the exchanges between people and environment, and the resulting balance or imbalance. The diagram on page 14S can only show some of the major concepts for guiding assessment during this stage. Additional questions and concepts relevant for particular situations will be needed and will have to be developed by practitioners and researchers as the actual use of assessment in practice is examined and clarified.
Through the use of professional judgment in assessing situations with which he must deal, the practitioner puts his professional knowledge to its first important use. The visibility and availability of relevant knowledge are crucial for social work practice. The fact that the profession must have a broad and growing body of knowledge does not mean that all practitioners must encompass the whole mass of knowledge. That would be impossible. It does mean that they must command the major generalizations and theoretical propositions so that they will be. able to find what is relevant for their use at any one time. Theory regarding separation and alienation is already recognized and being applied in this way. Theory regarding crisis is in the process of being worked out within the practice of social work and other professions. In order not to be dependent on a single cluster of knowledge or a few familiar theories, as has happened in the past, social workers will need to master a larger number of key propositions, which are still to be identified by the profession.
Clues for selecting knowledge. Basic theory is not enough; the practitioner also needs clearer guides for selecting knowledge in relation to his practice. Consider the two clusters of knowledge traditionally used in social work and known as "'sequences'' in the educational curriculum. They relate to (11 human behavior and the social environment and (2) social welfare policy and-sefvkjt}*-The need for sociafworkers to have knowledge about mail—particularly about the physical organism and its development, the personality, and the culture—is only too clear. The same is true in relation to social welfare, in which knowledge about social institutions and social policy is especially important.
However, ideas that would bring these two kinds of knowledge together in a meaningful way were too long hidden in social work's own practice, within the methods and fields of practice.
152 THE COMMON BASE OF SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE
Because the cognitive aspect of assessment was not emphasized in its own right and was so often embedded in the helping process itself, practitioners have not been sufficiently aware of the knowledge they use in practice. They need to be familiar not only with a considerable number of theoretical propositions but also with clues to selecting those most relevant to the specific situation they confront. One important characteristic and strength of social work, previously mentioned, has been that in viewing situations social workers have not usually thought in terms of single causes but have viewed social situations as involving interaction of multiple factors. They have also sought and used mainlands of knowledge and theory. This has, however, been done unevenly—by different groups and at different times—and often ineffectively because the profession did not provide practitioners with comprehensive guides for selecting appropriate knowledge propositions and applying them consistently in practice.
These needed concepts and criteria to guide the social workers use of knowledge come first from the core of the profession. A comprehensive concept concerned with people interacting and coping with their environment gives promise of offering a central focus and a group of related subcencepts adequate to provide the necessary guidance. Here are to be found the ideas relating to life tasks, coping patterns, environmental demands and supports, exchanges between people and their environment, and new concepts not yet perceived, all of which require disciplined examination and testing by the profession.
Practitioners must be able to judge when knowledge used bv aLL sociaLjsarkers—that which is. .common for. the .jrofcssipn— is sufficient to guide Jthian.in -assessing_s.imatio.ns_.und when additional knowledge, is needed. Social workers practicing regularly in the health field must command a larger body of concepts and theory regarding health and disease, psychosocial aspects of illness, and essentials of medical care than other social workers. Similarly, other social workers concerned with specific social problems and services must master the theory related to their practice. Because of the wide range of problems and the need to understand their meaning to people, social workers must be equipped to use special as well as basic knowledge in assessment. Especially in times of rapid change, social workers need guides in the form of concepts and criteria about how to select, try cut, combine.
PROFESSIONAL JUDGMENT IN ASSESSMENT 153
and apply the various kinds of knowledge diey must use in assessment.
Decisions Regarding Social Work Intervention
A third stage of assessment (also in the diagram on page 14S"i relates to use of the common base in reaching decisions regarding social work intervention. This is a situation into which the social worker and his profession, as represented by him, are about to become involved. His purpose is to define the kind of, social change r.ccdedand what social workers can do, through their distinctive approach and expertise, to influence movement, toward this change. Some of the first steps will be considered here; the discussion will be carried on in the next chapter.
Out of the multiple factors discovered in the broad preliminary view, the practitioner must identify those that appear most critical and define their interrelationship. In this stage of assessment, the concept of social functioning continues to guide the practitioner because it covers not only the active interchange between people and their environment but also the consequences of such exchange. The practitioner will have to consider the various consequences that can be regarded as possibly ensuing from the social situation and determine which interventive approaches maybe most effective in dealing with them. Social work values, as they relate to people and environment, will be continually taken into account in these decisions regarding action.
At this point another segment of social work knowledge becomes relevant, that relating to the range of interventive actions the profession can offer at any one time. Here again we are breaking new ground because social workers have traditionally directed their thinking along one track or another in considering the interventive measures to be applied in a specific situation. It is clear that the profession must now bring together the knowledge which all practitioners should have regarding the range of interventive approaches in social work.   This knowledge should
i .  ^toe viewed more as wavs of influencing social_change in people or.
' ' .insiiMtpns than as skills; to be learned. Thus, in assessment even-social worker will beabie to consider the alternative measures of inten;ej_tjon his profession can offer. His decision about the action needed in specific situations will then be determined not
15-;
the common' base of social work practice
narrowly in terms of his own particular competence or his agency's program but broadly in terms of his profession's full interventive repertoire.
As integrated and focused knowledge regarding social functioning is developed and included in the profession's system of knowledge, it can be anticipated that assessment strengthened by such knowledge will lead to more effective intervention in social situations. A practitioner who views situations in terms of patterns of coping and environmental demands and who commands growing knowledge about the relation between them will be in a position to influence change in a manner not possible before. Ways in which aged people can be offered opportunities to show interest in others who are deprived and thus enrich their own lives or professional workers in multiservice centers can listen more fully and respond more effectively to what people are trying to say to them would be examples of such exchanges. When common patterns are observed, recognized, and tested, social workers will have clues to ways of working with people and their environment which may be immediately effective, so that the people can soon carry on by themselves. This approach suggests a broader scope for short-term service than has yet been visualized, through increased and better focused knowledge.
Since this discussion is concerned with the common characteristics of social work assessment, no attempt has been made to consider the various diagnostic approaches now being used in social work practice. One point, however, is clear. As long as these approaches are used separately, they continue to fragment practice. Just as the specific knowledge used by different groups of practitioners needs to be continually related to the common base of knowledge, so the various diagnostic approaches (types of professional assessment) are based on and should be kept in continual relation to the profession's common base.
Instances from Practice
The concept of assessment as a cognitive process and the stages in assessment proposed here cannot be fully demonstrated in today's practice, but instances from practice illustrate trends in this direction. Consider the school situation reported by Vinter and Sarri. This study was concerned with the malperformance of
professional judgment in assessment 155
children in school and involved innovations in practice, concepts, and research design.11 We are particularly interested in what it shows us regarding social work ways of viewing and assessing social situations.
The concept guiding the examination in this study was that "malpcrfonnance patterns should be viewed as resultants of the interaction of both pupil characteristics and school conditions." 12 Most malperformiug pupils in the study group were found to have the innate capability to achieve satisfactorily.   Nevertheless the large majority were performing below their capabilities and also mamfesting various behavioral problems.   Schools used a variety of negative sanctions to curb malperformance.   Each school's system produced somewhat different kinds of pupils and problem behavior.   Children who performed beiovv a certain standard received low grades and might also be denied a wide variety of privileges and opportunities within the school.   They lost esteem among their classmates and were often subjected to negative parental responses.  Since the schools' record systems documented malperformance in detail, it was hard for the student to live down his past.   Teachers regarded student motivation as crucial and considered the penalty system necessary to mobilize pupil concent. They were also concerned about maintaining desirable conditions within the classroom and effective control over their students. In some schools, misperforming children were perceived to be challenging the teachers' authority.
The children were aware of the school system and felt burdened by their negative history. ''When you get in trouble, they never let up on you," said one child. An important finding was that most of these children were deficient in social skills needed for positive relations in the classroom. They suffered from self-doubt and suspicion that they were being singled out by their teachers. As a result, minor incidents often escalated into major crises. The findings show poor communication and excessive demands by the school in relation to the children's coping capacities.
u Rcbert D. Vinter and Rosemary C. Sarri, 'Malperformance in the Public School: A Croup Work Approach," Soda! Work, Vol. !0. No. 1 (January 1965). pp. 2-13. This article wis reprinted in Edwin }. Thomas, ed., Behavioral Science for Social Workers (New York: Free Press, 1967). pp. 350-362.
'■Ibid., p. 4.