Ethical Issues in the Use of Spiritually Based Interventions in Social Work Practice: What Are We Doing and Why

Abstract

This article provides a review of the literature regarding social workers' use of spiritually based interventions, factors predictive of such use, research on ethical issues, and findings related to educational preparation for spiritually sensitive practice. Results show that both social work practitioners and students are utilizing a substantial number of spiritually based interventions, that workers' personal spirituality is influential in intervention use, that there is no evidence of adherence to specific ethical guidelines, and that the majority of social workers receive little or no instruction on religion and spirituality in their professional programs. Recommendations for social work education, research, and practice are proposed for meeting the ethical challenges suggested by these findings.

Keywords:

• ethics
• religion
• spirituality
• practice interventions
• education
• research

Notes

1. Although two of the remaining 26 practitioner studies presented quantitative information on spiritually based interventions, they either did not provide specific data on the use of various interventions (Dane & Moore, 2005) or they reported data in a manner that was not comparable with other studies (mean use versus percentage of use) (Bullis, 1996).