The browser you are using is not supported by this website. All versions of Internet Explorer are no longer supported, either by us or Microsoft (read more here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/windows/end-of-ie-support).

Please use a modern browser to fully experience our website, such as the newest versions of Edge, Chrome, Firefox or Safari etc.

Elizabeth Martinell Barfoed

Elizabeth Martinell Barfoed

Senior lecturer | PhD in Social Work

Elizabeth Martinell Barfoed

Moving from ’gut feeling’ to ’pure facts’: launching the ASI interview as part of in-service training for social workers.

Author

  • Elizabeth Martinell Barfoed
  • Katarina Jacobsson

Summary, in English

Several standardized assessment instruments have been introduced in social work in the last ten years. One of them, the Addiction Severity Index (ASI), is used today in the Swedish social services, and in the Prison and probation services. Swedish state authorities make strong declarations to implement the ASI-interview while critics are sceptic to both its practical relevance and epistemological grounds. Given this background, the launching of the ASI-interview is important to study as a case of how new instruments (flagged under the banner of EBP) are introduced. How is this rather new innovation introduced to the field of social work? The aim of the article is to analyse how the ASI-interview is presented and taught through in-service training for Swedish social workers. From observations of in-service training sessions, two professional styles seem to surface: a “traditional” and a “new” professional style. The course leader tends to use contrasting dichotomies as resources for constructing these professional styles. For example, “objectivity” and “scientificity” are presented as new professional ideals, rather than common sense or ”gut feeling”, the latter connected to traditional social work. The construction of a new professional style can be seen as an endeavour to achieve professional status in a more classical sense, partly by making the profession and its content more visible, and also by asserting its legitimacy as evidence-based work.

Department/s

  • School of Social Work

Publishing year

2012

Language

English

Pages

5-20

Publication/Series

Nordic Social Work Research

Volume

2

Issue

1

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Topic

  • Social Work

Keywords

  • Standardized assessment instruments
  • ASI-interview
  • in-service training
  • evidence-based practice
  • social work
  • gut-feeling

Status

Published

Research group

  • Kriminal- och socialvetenskapligt nätverk

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 2156-857X