Human Behavior Theory: A Diversity Framework / Edition 1

by Roberta Greene

Overview

In recent years, advocates for civil rights for minorities, women, and gays and lesbians have become more informed consumers of mental health services. As a result, social work practitioners need to prepare themselves to serve diverse constituencies for who previously held behavioral and cultural assumptions have proven not to be universally applicable. The purpose of Greene's book is to help students and practitioners better understand how social workers have used human behavior theories to more competently address variations in group and community membership within the social worker-client encounter.

The book's approach is largely thematic. Most of the chapters explore how particular assumptions of a human behavior theory—psychoanalytic theory, psychodynamic/ego psychology theory, systems theory, behavioral theory, symbolic interaction theory, feminist theory, constructionist theory, small group theory, and an ecological perspective —have been used to answer issues related to cultural diversity. The challenges and limitations of each theory's applications across varying client constituencies are discussed throughout. What'sorts of new conceptual issues for the practitioner of family services are raised in work with minority families, for example, or with lesbian families? How does a specific theory help, or not help, in group-specific interventions and evaluations?

Intended as a companion volume to the widely adopted human behavior text by Greene and Ephross, Greene's new book fills the need for a wide, synthetic reading of the recent literature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780202360904
Publisher:	Transaction Publishers
Publication date:	12/31/1994
Series:	Modern Applications of Social Work Series
Edition description:	Older Edition
Pages:	319
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)
Lexile:	1470L (what's this?)

About the Author

Roberta R. Greene was the Louis and Ann Wolens Centennial Chair in Gerontology and Social Welfare at the School of Social Work, University of Texas-Austin. She has worked at the Council on Social Work Education and the National Association of Social Workers and has numerous publications.

Table of Contents

1: Social Work Practice Within a Diversity Framework; 2: A Diversity Framework for Human Behavior: Conceptual and Historical Reformulations; 3: The Social Work Interview: Legacy of Carl Rogers and Sigmund Freud; 4: Symbolic Interactionism: Social Work Assessment, Meanings, and Language; 5: Erikson’s Eight Stages of Development: Different Lenses; 6: Role Theory and Social Work Practice; 7: A Constructionist Approach With Diverse Populations; 8: Social Learning Theory: Empirical Applications to Culturally Diverse Practice; 9: A Systems Approach: Addressing Diverse Family Forms; 10: Small Group Theory and Social Work Practice: Promoting Diversity and Social Justice or Recreating Inequities?; 11: Working With Natural Social Networks: An Ecological Approach; 12: Power Factors in Social Work Practice; Epilogue: Power and the Social Work Profession