Imagined interactions of social workers in social work with families: how and why the practitioners talk to themselves?

ABSTRACT

The aim of this article is to understand the nature of imagined interactions among social workers in the child protection and to determine the implications for their social work. In the current social work social workers do not have enough space for reflection and this takes place mainly in their minds, often through ideas about (past or future) interactions between the worker and the client, through imagined interactions. However, these imagined interactions have not received sufficient research attention in social work in the past. Within the framework of the qualitative research two basic missions of imagined interactions were discovered in terms of the constructivist grounded theory. They were the intersubjective-creative and the subjective-emancipatory missions, within which there were other specific functions. The discovered nature of the imagined interactions is discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Imagined interactions
• social and legal protection of children
• vulnerable children
• missions and functions

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1. I2 – informat two.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kateřina Glumbíková

Kateřina Glumbíková is an assistant professor at the Faculty of Social Studies, University of Ostrava. Her research is focused on the issue of reflexivity in social work with vulnerable children and their families. Her research interests also include evaluation of social housing and homelessness of mothers, women and children without home.

Marek Mikulec

Marek Mikulec is an assistant professor at the Faculty of Social Studies, University of Ostrava. His research is focused on the issue of social housing and social exclusion. In addition, he participates on the development of the local system of social housing at the Ostrava City Authority.

Jelena Petrucijová

Jelena Petrucijová, Csc. is an professor at the Faculty of Social Studies of the University of Ostrava. Her topic of interest is values in social work.

Ivana Kowaliková

Ivana Kowaliková is a researcher at the Faculty of Social Studies, University of Ostrava. The topic of her research is social support of seniors in difficult situations and the implications for social work. The results of her research are published in scientific journals.

Veronika Zegzulková

Veronika Zegzulková is a PhD. student at the Faculty of Social Studies, University of Ostrava. Her research is focused on the issue of international social work education.

Kristina Wilamová

Kristina Wilamová is a PhD. student at the Faculty of Social Studies, University of Ostrava. Her dissertation project is focused on the topic of evaluation of social work for families in social housing from the perspective of clients.