Permanency Decisions in Child Welfare: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

This article presents findings from an exploratory in-depth qualitative research project with seventeen child welfare professionals exploring their permanency decisions with regards to Looked after Children. Thinking aloud-protocols and semi-structured interviews, in conjunction with a specifically constructed vignette were used to explore the permanency decisions of child welfare workers. Findings from this innovative research suggest that different decisions were taken by participants based on viewing the same vignette. However, even though the decisions differed, they clustered around the more interventionist options with most favouring adoption and foster care despite viable alternatives offered. There was broad consistency related to the rationale for the decisions taken, but this did not translate into a consistent permanency option being chosen. Possible reasons to account for this are that the decisions were heuristically constructed, idiosyncratic to individual inclinations and influenced by factors other than the individual needs of the service user. The implications of this are that children and families do not get a consistent and reliable response to their permanency needs. We therefore recommend the greater use of structured decision-making tools in permanency decisions to increase their objectivity and consistency.

Social worker decision‐making in court

“…Social workers, like everyone else, are susceptible to relying upon heuristic principals to make decisions. Developing a greater understanding of these can improve decision‐making in situations of uncertainty (Tversky & Kahneman, 1982), particularly around individual and cultural attitudes, beliefs, knowledge and values in respect of removing a child from their parents care (McCafferty et al, 2021). To develop learning from experience it is important to understand the structure of the task (Einhorn, 1982).…”

“…There is a lack of clear theoretical basis for how information is analysed or recommendations are made (Taylor, 2017) and there is an inconsistency in decision‐making between individuals (McCafferty et al, 2021). Decision‐making in this field is complex and multifaceted; there is no ‘perfect algorithm’ to provide the right answer (Samsonsen & Turney, 2017), and Preston‐Shoot (2014) notes that law is concerned with whether the right decision‐making approach is adopted, rather than the right decision is made.…”

“…While decision-making within the context of child protection has been studied previously (Benbenishty et al, 2015;Cowley Social worker's development of decision-making skills in care proceedings: The role of practice wisdom. Doherty, 2017;Nyathi, 2018;O'Connor & Leonard, 2014;Whittaker, 2018), its role in the legal framework of care proceedings has received less attention (Beckett et al, 2007;Burns et al, 2018;McCafferty et al, 2021;Skivenes & Tonheim, 2018) and is a research area that requires further investigation. Timely decision-making is important and delayed decisionmaking has a detrimental impact regardless of the type of court order sought (Selwyn et al, 2014) and delay itself can produce poorer outcomes for children due to the emotional harm of uncertainty around their future (Beckett et al, 2007).…”

“…The primary aim of care proceedings is to safeguard children and achieve 'better outcomes' for them (Dickens et al, 2019). However, the definition of 'outcomes' is poorly defined (Forrester, 2017), and there is no national framework for assessing outcomes (La Valle et al, 2019) or structuring assessments (McCafferty et al, 2021). Understanding local differences in decision-making is crucial to provide transparency (Harwin et al, 2019), and Munro (2019) explains that professional practice can be constrained by organizational culture, she advocates a 'positive error culture' to improve decision-making by understanding errors are likely to occur and using them as an opportunity to learn and not to blame.…”

Removing Biases in Communication of Severity Assessments of Intimate Partner Violence: Model Development and Evaluation

“…Nonetheless, society expects the decisions to be consistent, reliable, and fully justified, and correct evaluations of violence are of course crucial. These types of unwanted biases are shown to affect extremely crucial decisions, for example, permanency decisions in childcare [ 1 , 2 ], asylum adjudication [ 3 ], and parole decisions [ 4 ]. The evaluation of the severity of violence has also important implications for society in a general sense—how laws are instituted and applied and how resources are allocated to jurisdictions, the police, and social workers.…”