Solution Focused Research Articles

Critical Race Theory and the Limits of Relational Theory in Social Work with Women

The authors present a conceptual framework for expanding the use of relational theory with African-American women. Relational theory (RT) informs practice with women but is inadequate in addressing all aspects of culture and identity. RT presumes that all women desire or are able to make therapeutic connections, yet race, gender, and cultural experiences influence their ability to do so. Successful practice with minority women must address racism and its impact. Critical race theory (CRT) that incorporates a solution-focused (SF) approach is well-suited to address the limits of RT. This overview of a CRT/SF approach describes treatment for diverse women that extends RT and enhances effective social work practice to provide culturally sensitive treatment to women.

Passing on the Legacy of Insoo Kim Berg

Rather than focusing on problems and discussing them in detail, trying to understand motivation for behavior, the solution-focused approach instead asks people to think about what they want in life, and to imagine how they might achieve their preferred future. Solution-focused brief therapy is a proactive approach that finds strengths in people instead of deficits. It is an optimistic and positive way to deal with problems. Why? Is rarely asked in solution-focused (SF) discussions.

Is training in solution-focused working useful to community matrons?

This article evaluates the usefulness of a small initiative to train community matrons (CMs) in solution-focused (SF) approaches, from the perspective of the CMs. A SF approach is a psychologically sophisticated, yet relatively easy-to-use psychological model for enhancing care and wellbeing which can help to empower patients and promote self-care. Data from questionnaires completed by CMs immediately post training and from qualitative interviews conducted 12 months later suggest that training in SF approaches is considered useful, useable and relevant by the nurses themselves. More specifically, CMs reported that SF approaches allowed them to work alongside patients to investigate and amplify patients' own expertise in 'living well' despite their difficulties, contributing to improved patient self-management, less reliance on the CM, and greater job satisfaction for the CM. SF approaches seem to resonate with the current NHS drive for greater efficiency and better patient-centred care.

First steps towards a solution-focused older people’s mental health service

This article describes an ongoing piece of solution-focused (SF) development work located within an NHS mental health service for older people. This initiative was prompted by an invitation to a colleague and myself to provide SF training to all staff in the Trust. In a departure from previous training and development approaches within the Trust, the local manager wished that all of the staff within the clinical teams in the service should receive training in order that all would share an awareness of, and ability to use, the SF model in their work with older people. An opportunistic evaluation was undertaken of the impact of the training intervention – an SF training workshop – and service development, both in terms of immediate changes at the individual level, and longer term changes at the team and organisational level. This article is a summary of a dissertation I submitted as part of the MA in Solution-Focused Brief Therapy at the University of Birmingham.

Toward Solution Groupwork: Brief Solution-Focused Ideas in Group Parent Training

This article considers how the Solution-Focused (SF) model, as developed by de Shazer and Berg, may be applied in facilitating groupwork. We look at our use of the model in facilitating a series of parent training courses, in a child psychiatric setting based on the Webster-Stratton program. This is a structured program that uses video vignettes to model parenting techniques, drawn mainly from a behavioral/social learning model. We detail how solution focused ideas have informed our group process within this model. The article concludes that the Solution-Focused approach can be readily applied in a groupwork educational setting such as parent training, and can be used in combination with other therapeutic models.