Staying in Touch in the Digital Era: New Social Work Practice

ABSTRACT

The findings of a small-scale empirical study are drawn upon to explore the concept of social presence and the way in which it can contribute to meeting service users’ expectations of relationship-based social work. Findings from the study highlight the role of mobile communication technologies in establishing social presence with service users, and an argument is made for the proactive use of mobile devices as a component of direct practice. However, such emerging digital social work practices will require practitioners, and social work organizations, to respond positively to new ethical and organizational challenges.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• families
• relationship-based social work
• social media
• social presence