Book Review of “Human Behaviour and the Social Environment: Models, Metaphors, and Maps for Applying Theoretical Perspectives to Practice”. 640 pages, Thomson Brooks/Cole, 2007, by James A. Forte

This voluminous book which draws on almost 1000 references provides an important theoretical base for practice. After an informative introduction about models, maps and metaphors, Forte provides an impressive presentation of several perspectives for use in practice; applied ecological theory, applied system theory, applied biology, applied cognitive science, applied psychodynamic theory, applied behaviourism, applied symbolic interactionism, applied social role theory, applied economic theory, and applied critical theory. Finally he completes his book with a chapter on “Multi theory practice and routes to integration.”

Beyond Kantianism - Response to Critiques

I am flattered and privileged to have received four such astute critiques of my work from an international cast. I will reflect at length about many of their points in future work but to respond fully would require a very long article and so I will highlight some of the more salient issues. The authors share misgivings about my commitment to a realist version of governmentality theory so I will try to articulate a bit more clearly how it is different from two major alternative perspectives highlighted by the authors: what I term a `discursive` governmentality perspective (Stenson 2005), and the neo-Marxist regulationist school of political economy. However, deeper normative questions are raised, for example by Wendy Larner, about what it means to be progressive or critical within the broad terrain of liberalism (which can include neo-liberals and neo-conservatives) in the wake of the collapse of communism and much of the power of western labour movements, the rise of the new emancipatory and environmental social movements and varieties of religious fundamentalism. As social scientists and university intellectuals we usually argue that our work differs from journalistic reportage or ideological polemics that gather supportive evidence through selective fact gathering. This is because we dig beneath the flux of events and surface appearances and debates to uncover the deeper structures of thought and social relations that shape our experiences and the flow of events. And we also engage with contrary evidence that troubles our truth claims. This is the work of theory. I accept that theory plays a vital role but argue for a more grounded approach rooted in empirical research using a variety of methods and data sources. Hence I adopt a more cautious approach to conceptions of the `deeper structures` we uncover. At best we can only know them through provisional heuristic modelling and it is best not to reify them.

Curricular Integration of Simulations in Neuroscience - Instructional and Technical Perspectives

In recent years interactive media and tools, like scientific simulations and simulation environments or dynamic data visualizations, became established methods in the neural and cognitive sciences. Hence, university teachers of neural and cognitive sciences are faced with the challenge to integrate these media into the neuroscientific curriculum. Especially simulations and dynamic visualizations offer great opportunities for teachers and learners, since they are both illustrative and explorable. However, simulations bear instructional problems: they are abstract, demand some computer skills and conceptual knowledge about what simulations intend to explain. By following two central questions this article provides an overview on possible approaches to be applied in neuroscience education and opens perspectives for their curricular integration: (i) How can complex scientific media be transformed for educational use in an efficient and (for students on all levels) comprehensible manner and (ii) by what technical infrastructure can this transformation be supported? Exemplified by educational simulations for the neurosciences and their application in courses, answers to these questions are proposed a) by introducing a specific educational simulation approach for the neurosciences b) by introducing an e-learning environment for simulations, and c) by providing examples of curricular integration on different levels which might help academic teachers to integrate newly created or existing interactive educational resources in their courses.

Beyond the Pro and Contra of Evidence-Based Practice: Reflections on a Recurring Dilemma at the Core of Social Work

Currently, social work is witnessing a quite polarized debate about what should be the basis for good practice. Simply stated, the different attempts to define the required basis for effective and accountable interventions in social work practice can be grouped in two paradigmatic positions, which seem to be in strong opposition to each other. On the one hand the highly influential evidence based practice movement highlights the necessity to base practice interventions on proven effectiveness from empirical research. Despite some variations, such as between narrow conceptions of evidence based practice (see e.g. McNeece/Thyer, 2004) and broader approaches to it (see e.g. Gambrill, 1999, 2001, 2008), the evidence based practice movement embodies a positivist orientation and more explicitly scientific aspirations of social work by using positivistic empirical strategies. Critics of the evidence based practice movement argue that its narrow epistemological assumptions are not appropriate for the understanding of social phenomena and that evidence based guidelines to practice are insufficient to deal with the extremely complex activities social work practice requires in different and always somewhat unique practice situations (Webb, 2001; Gray & Mc Donald, 2006; Otto, Polutta &Ziegler, 2009). Furthermore critics of evidence based practice argue that it privileges an uncritical and a-political positivism which seems highly problematic in the current climate of welfare state reforms, in which the question ‘what works’ is highly politicized and the legitimacy of professional social work practice is being challenged maybe more than ever before (Kessl, 2009). Both opponents and proponents of evidence based practice argue on the epistemological, the methodological and the ethical level to sustain their point of view and raise fundamental questions about the real nature of social work practice, so that one could get the impression that social work is really at the crossroads between two very different conceptions of social work practice and its further professional development (Stepney, 2009). However, this article is not going to merely rehearse the pro and contra of different positions that are being invoked in the debate about evidence based practice. Instead it aims to go further by identifying the dilemmas underlying these positions which - so it is argued – re-emerge in the debate about evidence based practice, but which are older than this debate. They concern the fundamental ambivalence modern professionalization processes in social work were subjected to from their very beginnings.

Why Do We Think Practice Research is a Good Idea? Comments and Musings Inspired by the Salisbury Statement

In this paper I raise some questions about current understandings of practice research and whether they are worth pursuing. In particular, the notion of a gap between practice and research is examined in terms of how it constricts thinking about this issue. I also attempt to explicate some of the less examined assumptions associated with practice research. Finally, I suggest that we embrace multiplicity, not by trying to accommodate all views under the practice research umbrella, but by accepting that there will be many versions of practice research that will have differential appeal.