Social work research has gathered a greater transparency and clarity of identity in North American and parts of Europe. Furthermore, the rapid emergence of social work research in other European countries, China, India, Japan and elsewhere in Asia and Pacific Rim countries, and gradually in South America, has created a need for a collection that can contribute to both shaping and making accessible key and sometimes hard-to-access sources.

VOLUME ONE - HISTORICAL TRAJECTORIES, PURPOSES AND KEY CONCEPTSPart One: Emergence and Developing Trajectories of Social Work Research The Scientific Spirit and Social Work - Arthur J. Todd What Is Social Case Work? An Introductory Description - Mary E. Richmond What Social Case Records Should Contain to Be Useful for Sociological Interpretation - Ernest W. Burgess Is Casework Effective? - Joel Fischer Methods for Experimenting Society - Donald T. Campbell` How Psychology Got Its Variables - Kurt Danziger and Katalin Dzinas Rereading The Jack-Roller: Hidden Histories in Sociology and Social Work - Ian ShawPart Two: Purposes and Over-Arching Concepts of Social Work Research Models of Helping and Coping` - Philip Brickman et al. The Making and Molding of Child Abuse - Ian Hacking A Genealogy of Dependency: Tracing a Keyword of the U.S. Welfare State - Fraser Nancy and Linda Gordon The Strengths Perspective in Social Work Practice: Extensions and Cautions - Dennis Saleebey Organizational and Personal Dimensions in Diversity Climate: Ethnic and Gender Differences in Employee Diversity Perceptions - Michàl Mor Barak, David Cherin and Sherry Berkman Social Work and the Quest for Effective Practice - Aaron Rosen, Enola K. Proctor and Marlys M. Staudt The Role of Science in Social Work: The Perennial Debate - William J. Reid User Involvement in Research and Evaluation: Liberation or Regulation? - Peter Beresford Social Research Today Some Dilemmas and Distinctions - Martyn Hammersley Research as an Element in Social Work's Ongoing Search for Identity - Walter Lorenz Why Most Published Research Findings Are False - John P. A. IoannidisVOLUME TWO: KEY DECISIONS ABOUT RESEARCH STRATEGY Experimental Research in Social Casework - James Robinson Mousetraps, Developmental Research, and Social Work Education - Edwin J. Thomas Knowers, Knowing, Known: Feminist Theory and Claims of Truth - Mary E. Hawkesworth Connecting Method and Epistemology: A White Woman Interviewing Black Women - Rosalind Edwards Standpoint Theory and the Questions of Social Work Research - Mary E. Swigonski Psychological Inquiry and the Pragmatic and Hermeneutic Traditions - Donald Polkinghorne Quality Issues in Qualitative Inquiry - Clive Seale Five Misunderstandings about Case-Study Research - Bent Flyvbjerg Digging for Nuggets: How 'Bad' Research Can Yield 'Good' Evidence - Ray Pawson Knowledge for Theory and Practice - Andrew H. Van de Ven and Paul E. Johnson Is Mixed Methods Social Inquiry a Distinctive Methodology? - Jennifer Greene Horizons of Human Inquiry - K. Gergen Explaining Social Work Practice - The CAIMeR Theory - Björn Blom and Stefan Morén Outcome Studies of Social, Behavioral, and Educational Interventions: Emerging Issues and Challenges - Mark W. Fraser et al. More than Method? A Discussion of Paradigm Differences within Mixed Methods Research - Gitte Sommer HarritsVOLUME THREE: THE PRACTICE OF SOCIAL WORK RESEARCH The Social Worker, the Client and the Social Anthropologist - Martin Davies and Elinor Kelly Evaluation of a Social Work Service for Self-Poisoning Patients - J. S. Gibbons et al. Narrative Studies, Personal Stories, and Identity Transformation in the Mutual Help Context - Julian Rappaport Unobtrusive Mobilization by an Institutionalized Rape Crisis Center - Frederika E. Schmitt and Patricia Yancey Martin Practitioners as Rule Using Analysts: A Further Development of Process Knowledge in Social Work - Michael Sheppard and Kate Ryan Narrative in Social Work: A Critical Review - Catherine Riessman and Lee Quinney Comparison of Social Work Practice in Teams Using a Video Vignette Technique in a Multi-method Design - Leena Eskelinen and Dorte Caswell Propensity Score Matching Strategies for Evaluating Substance Abuse Service for Child Welfare Clients - Shenyang Guo, Richard Barth and Claire Gibbons Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care for Girls in the Juvenile Justice System: 2-Year Follow-up of a Randomized Clinical Trial - Patricia Chamberlain, Leslie D. Leve and Daivd S. DeGarmo Researching the History of Social Work: Exposition of a History of the Present Approach - Caroline Skehill Male Child Sexual Abuse: A Phenomenology of Betrayal - Ramons Alaggia and Graeme Millington How Do Child and Family Social Workers Talk to Parents about Child Welfare Concerns? - Donald Forrester et al. Ethics and the Practice of Qualitative Research - Ian Shaw Psychotherapy Change Process Research: Realizing the Promise - Robert Elliott Theorizing Practice Research in Social Work - Lars UggerhøjVOLUME FOUR: THE CONTEXTS OF SOCIAL WORK RESEARCHPart One: Problems, domains and social work institutional and practice contexts Preadmission Screening: An Efficacy Study - Barbara Berkman et al. The Background of Children Who Enter Local Authority Care - Andrew Bebbington and John Miles Children in Secure Accommodation - Robert Harris and Noel Timms When Evaluation Meets the 'Rough Ground' in Communities - Thomas Schwandt and Peter Dahler-Larsen Habitual Trust in Encountering Violence at Work: Attitudes towards Client Violence among Finnish Social Workers and Nurses - Tuija Virkki Performing 'Initial Assessment': Identifying the Latent Conditions for Error at the Front-Door of Local Authority Children¿s Services - Karen Broadhurst et al.Part Two: Professional, Disciplinary and Governmental Expectations Regarding Best Evidence The Empirical Practice Movement - William J. Reid Evidence-based Practice: An Alternative to Authority-based Practice - Eileen Gambrill Evidence-based Practice - The End of Professional Social Work or Architect of a New Professionalism? - Peter Sommerfeld Evidence for the Art of Social Work - Clay T. Graybeal Practitioner Expertise in Evidence-based Practice Decision Making - Stanley G. McCracken and Jeanne C. MarshPart Three: Political, Ethical, Intellectual, Social, Cultural and Spatial Contexts Science as a Vocation - Max Weber Democratising Expertise and Socially Robust Knowledge - Helga Nowotny A Proper Place to Live: Health Inequalities, Agency and the Normative Dimensions of Space - Jennie Popay et al. Exploring Tongan Social Work Fakafekau'aki (Connecting) and Fakatokilalo (Humility) - Tracie Mafile'o Between Professional Ethics and Bureaucratic Rationality: The Challenging Ethical Position of Social Workers Who Are Faced with Implementing a Workfare Policy - Monica Kjoerstad Human Rights and Capabilities - Amartya Sen Researching 'at Home' as an Insider/Outsider: Gender and Culture in an Ethnographic Study of Social Work Practice in an Arab Society - Sahar S. Al-Makhamreh and Gillian Lewando-Hundt Burden and Consequences of Child Maltreatment in High-Income Countries - Ruth Gilbert et al.