Title

Assessing Clinical MSW Students' Attitudes, Attributions, and Responses to Poverty

Department/School

Social Work

Date of this version

2016

Document Type

Article

Keywords

education, poverty alleviation, social justice, survey research

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1080/10875549.2015.1105345

Abstract

The choices social workers make to assist people in poverty may be attributable to the attitudes they bring to their social work education but might also be attributable to the explanations for poverty they learned during their programs. This study surveyed 337 students in a clinical MSW program about their attitudes toward the poor, attributions for poverty, and beliefs regarding models of interventions regarding poverty. Students preferred structural attributions for poverty over individual attributions for poverty. They also strongly endorsed structural responses but simultaneously endorsed psychological responses. Future research should investigate students’ connections between attitudes towards the poor, attributions for poverty and beliefs regarding intervention responses.

Volume

20

Issue

4

Published in

Journal of Poverty

Citation/Other Information

Hill, K., Toft, J., Garret, K., Ferguson, S., & Kuechler, C. (2016) Assessing Clinical MSW Students' Attitudes, Attributions, and Responses to Poverty. Journal of Poverty, 20(4), 396-416. https://doi.org/10.1080/10875549.2015.1105345

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