I am writing this editorial whilst in lockdown for the coronavirus pandemic. Heartrending stories of the trauma being experienced by families and professionals fill our news broadcasts and it is clear that many professionals are experiencing secondary traumatic stress. Social workers always operate in challenging environments and part of the training and professional development for social workers focuses on developing resilience. Nonetheless there are circumstances where additional attention to secondary traumatic stress is needed, since it can lead to reduced performance in both the professional and personal spheres of a social workers life, and we have two articles in this edition of Practice which address this.
The first article by Francine Masson and Jacqueline Moodley, ‘Secondary Traumatic Stress: The Experiences of Social Workers in the South African Police Service’, reports on a study of occupational and forensic social workers employed by the South African Police Service (SAPS). To remain an effective practitioner, the mental health of a social worker is an important aspect that needs to be nurtured and safeguarded. The research revealed that social workers employed within SAPS, whether in an occupational or forensic capacity, are exposed to secondary trauma. Practitioners were particularly affected by certain cases: Cases where children died from abuse and neglect, police suicides and femicide-suicides were emotionally challenging cases. The study also reports significant differences in Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) between Black and White social workers, as STS levels in White social workers were higher. They suggest that Black South Africans have been exposed to excessive amounts of trauma through the apartheid system and it is possible that they may have become desensitised and developed a level of hardiness that enable them to cope better. This study highlights the need for organisations which employ social workers to ensure that there are workplace policies which incorporate strategies to ameliorate secondary traumatisation and promote self-care.
In the second article, ‘Individual and Organisational Practices Addressing Social Workers’ Experiences of Vicarious Trauma’, Simon Ashley-Binge and Carolyn Cousins suggest that organisations employing social workers do not always take a preventative or proactive approach to addressing vicarious trauma, often assuming the provision of supervision and encouraging worker self-care will be sufficient. They present a narrative literature review which argues that organisations should be encouraged to accept responsibility for addressing vicarious trauma as a work health and safety issue, examining the contribution of workplace culture and workload expectations to vicarious trauma experiences. While the literature review revealed strong support for the recognition of organisational contributions to vicarious trauma alongside individual responsibilities, most organisations themselves do not appear to yet accept this link as requiring a response.
The next paper in this edition, by Orlanda Harvey and Margarete Parrish, ‘Social Work Implications of Anabolic–Androgenic Steroid Use, Particularly Among Young People: A Literature Review’, considers what knowledge social workers might require to work effectively in this domain. They hypothesise that although rarely addressed in the existing social work literature, the risks associated with anabolic-androgenic steroid (ASS) use, particularly in young people, necessitate more awareness and attention from social work practitioners particularly in today’s image conscious society. An awareness of the risks associated with AAS use is both relevant and important knowledge for social work practice with an array of services users and further research into the psychosocial factors related to young people’s use of ASS is needed.
The final paper in this edition, ‘Does Training Enhance Professional Practice in Infant Mental Health?’, by Teresa Hughes, Anne McGlade and Campbell Killick contextualises their study by noting the lack of robust evaluation of training outcomes in the delivery of Health & Social Care and the impact on adult mental health of poor emotional care during infancy and early childhood. The paper reports that their study (pre- and post- training) validates the effectiveness of infant mental health training for social workers and other professionals. Their findings also confirm that the confidence gained from increased knowledge encourages staff to put their learning into practice. Higher levels of confidence in one’s ability to perform correlates with increased persistence levels and people’s sense of empowerment. The study has also found an improvement in the capacity of adult services staff to identify vulnerability in infants if engaging in family inclusive practice.
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