BSW Students’ Descriptions of an Experiential Exercise on Intimate Partner Violence

ABSTRACT

Little is known about preparing BSW students to work with intimate partner violence (IPV). This study describes an experiential exercise designed to introduce them to working with survivors of IPV. Qualitative methods were used to explore BSW student descriptions of their experiences of and learning from the exercise. Analysis revealed students’ descriptions of knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to work with IPV survivors, included awareness of the need for more knowledge about IPV, the complexity of decisions survivors make, empathy for survivors, and how students would work with such clients in the future. Recommendations for social work educators include the need for them to provide information on IPV; to increase both interpersonal and social empathy; how bias can affect attitudes toward survivors; the need to address students’ struggles with issues of self-determination; obtaining resources, and the necessity of supporting students with their own trauma histories.

KEYWORDS:

• Domestic violence
• intimate partner violence
• experiential learning
• simulations
• empathy

Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).