PERSON-IN-ENVIRONMENT & ECOLOGICAL THINKING
This social work perspective emphasizes understanding individuals within the context of their environment.
What is the Person-in-Environment perspective?
This theory views society as interconnected parts working together to maintain stability.
What is Structural Functionalism?
This organizational perspective values hierarchy, rules, efficiency, and productivity.
What is the Rational Perspective?
This theory of change views organizations as moving through predictable stages over time.
What is Life-Cycle Theory?
This leadership style focuses on rewards, consequences, and exchanges.
What is Transactional Leadership?
According to Abundant Community, this already exists within communities.
What is capacity?
This ecological level includes relationships between microsystems such as family and school.
What is the mesosystem?
This theory focuses on power, inequality, and competition for resources.
What is Conflict Theory?
This perspective views organizations as living systems interacting with the environment.
What is the Systems Perspective?
This theory focuses on purposeful and goal-driven organizational change.
What is Teleological Theory?
This leadership style inspires vision, motivation, and growth.
What is Transformational Leadership?
This tenet suggests communities already possess enough resources and strengths.
What is “What we have is enough”?
A social worker helping a client understand how housing instability, racism, and unemployment affect mental health is using this approach.
What is ecological/systems thinking?
This theory emphasizes how individuals and systems continuously influence one another.
What is Systems Theory?
Shared beliefs, rituals, symbols, and traditions within an agency are known as this.
What is Organizational Culture?
This theory suggests change occurs through conflict between opposing forces.
What is Dialectical Theory?
This leadership style focuses on helping organizations respond to complex and changing problems.
What is Adaptive Leadership?
This approach focuses on cooperation, connection, and neighborhood relationships rather than dependency on institutions.
What is capacity building or community-building?
Explain why social workers should avoid viewing problems as purely individual issues.
Because behavior is influenced by larger systems including family, organizations, communities, culture, institutions, and social inequalities.
A social worker advocating against wage inequality from a gendered perspective may be applying this perspective.
What is the Feminist or Anti-Oppressive Perspective?
Give one example of how organizational culture can positively or negatively impact clients.
Possible examples:
This theory compares organizational adaptation to natural selection and survival.
What is Evolutionary Theory?
A supervisor who encourages collaboration and shared decision-making is demonstrating this leadership style.
What is Facilitative Leadership?
Give one example of how a neighborhood can build abundance.
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A teenager is struggling academically. Analyze the issue using at least THREE ecological levels.
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Compare Structural Functionalism and Conflict Theory in how they would explain homelessness.
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Explain how an agency might respond differently to change using the Rational Perspective versus the Critical Perspective.
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Provide a real-world social work example of organizational change and identify which theory best explains it.
Answers will vary. Examples may include COVID policy changes, agency mergers, billing changes, telehealth implementation, etc.
Compare Transactional and Transformational leadership in a human service agency.
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Explain how social workers can unintentionally weaken communities when they only focus on deficits.
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