The Religious/Spiritually Integrated Practice Assessment Scale for Educators: A National Survey of Social Work Faculty

ABSTRACT

Although there has been increased attention to religion and spirituality (RS) over the past few decades in social work, little is understood about the delivery of this content within the social work curriculum and social work educators’ views and behaviors regarding training students on this area of practice. The current study attempts to address this by (a) describing the development and validation of the Religious/Spiritually Integrated Practice Assessment Scale for Educators (RSIPAS-EDU); (b) describing a national sample of 833 master of social work (MSW) educators’ self-efficacy, attitudes, perceived feasibility, behaviors, and overall orientation toward training students to integrate clients’ RS in practice; and (c) indicating MSW faculty charactertistics that predict their orientation toward this topic in social work education. The results suggest that the RSIPAS-EDU is reliable (α=.96) and valid overall and across the four subscales, and that while MSW faculty indicate high levels of self-efficacy, positive attitudes, and relatively few barriers, fewer reported engagement with training students to integrate clients’ RS. Further, the three predictors of their overall RSIPAS-EDU score included intrinsic religiosity, prior training (course or continuing education), and knowledge of empirically supported interventions that integrate clients’ RS. Implications for social work education and future studies are discussed.

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Spencer Foundation [grant #201900208].

Notes on contributors

Holly K. Oxhandler

Holly K. Oxhandler, PhD, LMSW, is an associate professor and the associate dean for research and faculty development at Baylor University's Garland School of Social Work. Edward C. Polson, PhD, LMSW, MDiv, is an associate professor at Baylor University's Garland School of Social Work. Kelsey M. Moffatt, LCSW, is a PhD student at Baylor University's Garland School of Social Work.