Social work students’ risk assessment of neurodivergent children and adolescents

Abstract

This study examined how 95 Danish social work students assessed the risk of neurodivergent children (autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) facing social issues later in life. We used the vignette method where all students studied the same cases, followed by each assessing the size of the risk of problems that each case would likely experience. Despite evaluating the same cases, their risk assessments varied widely and were unrealistic compared to data from Statistics Denmark. The expressed risks—in words or percentages—significantly differed among them. Furthermore, the students used the same terminologies indicating risk levels, such as high risk; however, the percentage values they envisioned for these risk sizes differed significantly. This makes both accurate risk assessment and risk communication among the students challenging. Based on assessing 10 risks for a family in a detailed case the students were categorized as high-, middle-, or low-risk assessors; however, there were no substantial differences in their views on risk and protective factors. They mentioned six different protective and nine different risk factors; of these, however, only four were mentioned by more than 50% of the students. Our study shows that social work education must address risk assessments and communication about risk.

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