“Should Social Workers be Engaged in these Practices?” by G. Holden and K. Barker (2018). Journal of Evidence-based Social Work, 15, 1–13.
Thank you for beginning the important, and revealing, discussion around social workers practicing pseudoscience. Your search results were impressive with the amount of non-evidence- based practices by social workers. I know the list does not represent the entire social work field, but I do know it represents a troubling trend.
In addition to your vast list, I have seen in my own professional associations a willingness to provide workshops, live webinars, and conference sessions on topics that are clearly not research-based and can cause harm. Reiki, homeopathy, herbal treatments, and acupuncture are regular features at many social work conferences. My efforts to question the veracity or clinical applicability of these approaches have been met with the usual willful and ignorant response “But patients are using these therapies, we need to understand them” or “What’s the harm?” The passive acceptance of these questionable, if not outright sham, practices is a bothersome trend that social workers should pay attention to, as advocates for vulnerable populations.
Our clients rely on us as professionals to do our research as much as they depend on us to be open minded. When we say nothing about therapies that clearly don’t work; or endorse the use of the placebo effect, we are negligent of our responsibilities and underestimate our professional impact. To answer the authors more specifically, “What will you do about it”, I suggest the following: 1. Review your professional organizations conference material and raise questions about pseudoscience topics, request credible research-based studies to back up their claims. 2. Get on the boards of conference committees to have a voice about the content being presented. 3. If you must talk about pseudoscientific practices, be sure to provide factual information to encourage critical thinking. 4. Write editorials and blogs on the subject. I will bring it into the light, that’s what I’ll do about it and hope others will as well