Burn-Out Among Social Work Professionals: A Behavioral Approach to Causal and Interventive Knowledge

Although the phenomenon of staff burn-out represents a significant problem for the effective administration and functioning of social service settings, there has been a general paucity of empirically based research on this issue. The staggering financial, personal and social costs associated with staff burn-out emphasize the fact that we can no longer accept the sole use of descriptive and correlational studies of the problem. This paper suggests refocusing our theoretical perspective of the problem of staff burn-out from an emphasis on the dispositional qualities of burnedout staff members, to examining the social and situational contingencies of reinforcement responsible for the acquisition and maintenance of burnout. In addition, this paper discusses the application of experimental methodologies designed to identify causative factors and evaluate interventive procedures. It is believed that this approach will facilitate our understanding of the causes of burn-out and assist in developing effective interventive procedures

Serving the Homeless: Evaluating the Effectiveness of Homeless Shelter Services

The effects of homeless assistance services at the local level are tremendously difficult to ascertain. In this study, a four-month sample of homeless persons served by a local homeless shelter and case management program were contacted nine to eleven months after receiving services. The findings suggest that the program had some initial success in assisting the homeless clients to locate housing within the first year after leaving the shelter. However, the housing costs paid by these formerly homeless were quite high, with nearly three-quarters of them spending forty percent or more of their income on housing

Does wilderness therapy reduce recidivism in delinquent adolescents?: A narrative review

Adolescent recidivism rates remain high in the United States despite the fact juvenile crime has declined since the 1990’s. Wilderness therapy (WT) is an emerging treatment approach for adolescents involved in the juvenile justice system. This review examines outcome studies utilizing a wilderness therapy program in an effort to reduce adolescent recidivism. Studies were eligible if they: (a) evaluated a WT intervention, (b) utilized an adolescent population, (c) included a measure of recidivism as an outcome variable, and were (d) published in English between 1990 and June of 2010 in a peer-reviewed journal. A total of seven studies on WT were included, and the majority of studies indicated mildly positive short-term results though long-term effects were mixed. The overall quality of the evaluations designs was low, indicating the need for better controlled and longer term experimental evaluations

The determinants of household water consumption: A review and assessment framework for research and practice

Achieving a thorough understanding of the determinants of household water consumption is crucial to support demand management strategies. Yet, existing research on household water consumption determinants is often limited to specific case studies, with findings that are difficult to generalize and not conclusive. Here, we first contribute an updated framework for review, classification, and analysis of the literature on the determinants of household water consumption. Our framework allows trade-off analysis of different criteria that account for the representation of a potential water consumption determinant in the literature, its impact across heterogeneous case studies, and the effort required to collect information on it. We then review a comprehensive set of 48 publications with our proposed framework. The results of our trade-off analysis show that distinct groups of determinants exist, allowing for the formulation of recommendations for practitioners and researchers on which determinants to consider in practice and prioritize in future research

An efficient causative event-based approach for deriving the annual flood frequency distribution

In ungauged catchments or catchments without sufficient streamflow data, derived flood frequency methods are often applied to provide the basis for flood risk assessment. The most commonly used event-based methods, such as design storm and joint probability approaches are able to give fast estimation, but can also lead to prediction bias and uncertainties due to the limitations of inherent assumptions and difficulties in obtaining input information (rainfall and catchment wetness) related to events that cause extreme floods. An alternative method is a long continuous simulation which produces more accurate predictions, but at the cost of massive computational time. In this study a hybrid method was developed to make the best use of both event-based and continuous approaches. The method uses a short continuous simulation to provide inputs for a rainfall-runoff model running in an event-based fashion. The total probability theorem is then combined with the peak over threshold method to estimate annual flood distribution. A synthetic case study demonstrates the efficacy of this procedure compared with existing methods of estimating annual flood distribution. The main advantage of the hybrid method is that it provides estimates of the flood frequency distribution with an accuracy similar to the continuous simulation approach, but with dramatically reduced computation time. This paper presents the method at the proof-of-concept stage of development and future work is required to extend the method to more realistic catchments. © 2014 Elsevier B.V.Jing Li, Mark Thyer, Martin Lambert, George Kuczera, Andrew Metcalf

Differential effectiveness of prevalent social work practice models: A meta-analysis

This meta-analysis of 45 recently published (1990–1994) independent studies of social work\u27s differential effectiveness by prevalent practice models builds on the more general findings of related meta-analyses that have estimated that three-quarters of the clients who participate in social work interventions do better than the average client who does not. It found that the effectiveness of interventions based on different practice models—personal versus systemic-structural—was moderated by their primary focus for change. When the focus for change was clients themselves, personal orientations seemed more effective, whereas systemic-structural models were found to be more effective in supporting the change of other targets, such as environmental factors (structural change) rather than personal adaptation to environmental challenges

State updating and calibration period selection to improve dynamic monthly streamflow forecasts for an environmental flow management application

Monthly to seasonal streamflow forecasts provide useful information for a range of water resource management and planning applications. This work focuses on improving such forecasts by considering the following two aspects: (1) state updating to force the models to match observations from the start of the forecast period, and (2) selection of a shorter calibration period that is more representative of the forecast period, compared to a longer calibration period traditionally used. The analysis is undertaken in the context of using streamflow forecasts for environmental flow water management of an open channel drainage network in southern Australia. Forecasts of monthly streamflow are obtained using a conceptual rainfall–runoff model combined with a post-processor error model for uncertainty analysis. This model set-up is applied to two catchments, one with stronger evidence of non-stationarity than the other. A range of metrics are used to assess different aspects of predictive performance, including reliability, sharpness, bias and accuracy. The results indicate that, for most scenarios and metrics, state updating improves predictive performance for both observed rainfall and forecast rainfall sources. Using the shorter calibration period also improves predictive performance, particularly for the catchment with stronger evidence of non-stationarity. The results highlight that a traditional approach of using a long calibration period can degrade predictive performance when there is evidence of non-stationarity. The techniques presented can form the basis for operational monthly streamflow forecasting systems and provide support for environmental decision-making.Matthew S. Gibbs, David McInerney, Greer Humphrey, Mark A. Thyer, Holger R. Maier, Graeme C. Dandy and Dmitri Kavetsk

An assessment framework for classifying determinants of household water consumption and their priorities for research and practice

Achieving a thorough understanding of the determinants of household water consumption is crucial to support demand management strategies. Yet, existing research on household water consumption determinants is often limited to specific case studies, with findings that are difficult to generalize and not conclusive. Here, we contribute a framework for review, classification, and analysis of the literature on the determinants of household water consumption. Firstly, we identify a comprehensive set of 48 relevant publications, based on a systematic paper search. The framework firstly classifies household determinants into observable (physically seen/measured aspects of the house), latent (relates to the way occupants think/act/feel) and external (external to house and influence at regional level). Secondly, we undertake a trade-off analysis of different criteria that account for the representation of a potential water consumption determinant in the literature, its impact across heterogeneous case studies, and the effort required to collect information on it. The results of our trade-off analysis show that distinct groups of determinants exist, allowing for the formulation of four recommendation categories. These provide guidance for practitioners on which determinants to consider in practice and for researchers to prioritize in future research (Figure 1).A. Cominola, L. Preiss, M. Thyer, H. R. Maier, P. Prevos, R. Stewart, and A. Castellett