The Importance Of Empathy In Social Work

Poetry is an effective means used to convey a variety of emotions, from grief, to love, to empathy. This form of text relies heavily on imagery and comparison to inflict the reader with the associated feelings. As such, is displayed within Stephen Dunn 's, aptly named poem, Empathy. Quite ironically, Dunn implores strong diction to string along his cohesive plot of a man seeing the world in an emphatic light. The text starts off by establishing the military background of the main protagonist, as he awaits a call from his lover in a hotel room. After his significant other finally calls him, presumably to end the relationship, he then aimlessly goes to the zoo. Empathy, by Stephen Dunn exponentially displays the interplay of empathy and self interests, as the main protagonist seeks out his individualistic desires by searching for an empathetic connection through other living vessels.`

What does it "starting where the client is" meant to you as a social worker?

The National Association of Social Workers (NASW, 2009) Code of Ethics is a guide to social workers’ practice by offering standards, values, and principles. The Code of Ethics is useful in facilitating the social workers’ decision-making process when he is presented with complicate ethical issues. Ethical issues arise with conflicting values, principles, and standards. These conflicts may occur between the social worker and his clients, agency, or institutional policy, other social workers, professional in other disciplines, or the social worker’s personal values.

Who I identify as, including identifying as a social worker once I graduate, will have some level privilege and power attached to the chosen identities. Gelfand, Sillivan, and Steinhouse (2002) noted that there are may dimensions that influence our personal and professional relationships with others, and these dimensions shape how we see and interact with, include or exclude them, and ways that we oppress or discriminate against them. As a social worker whose clients share my same identity, we may benefit by my having a shared understanding of cultural norms and expectations to reach a common goal. For clients who share commonalities with me, we may benefit by being able to work more collaboratively and possibly a more trusting relationship than one that must be built over time. However, just as similarities can be empowering, I must remember that the client knows best despite our shared identities that may speak otherwise. In addition, challenges can arise when there is no commonality in identities or when identities between myself and a client are radically different. In these times, as a social worker who has a degree of power in a relationship with people seeking help, that I must acknowledge to myself that my power can impede on inclusively practicing and remain self-aware (Gelfand, Sullivan, & Steinhouse,

1. Describe anticipatory empathy in your own words. In what situations have you made use of this skill before? How would you describe the relationship between anticipatory empathy and social justice work?

The article “Ethics and Value Dilemmas in Social Work” is written by Suncica Dimitrijevska and Vladimir Ilievski, published by Polirom & Universitatea Bucureşti - Dept. de Sociologie is Asistenţă Socialăby 2016.The article talks about the ethics which a social worker needs to follow and the dilemmas which they face while they deal with the different cases in their day to day life. A social worker 's decision never gets influenced by the clients age, culture, psyche or psychological abilities. This article discusses about various topics like, ‘ethical dilemmas during client support, values and knowledge in social work, values dilemmas of the clients encountered by the social workers, areas of ethical dilemmas facing social work and steps for solving the ethical dilemmas’(Dimitrijoska, Ilievski- 2016, p.49).

From time to time, social work practitioners face different challenges and one of such example is being confronted with ethical dilemmas. An ethical dilemma is defined as “when the social worker sees himself or herself as facing a choice between two equally unwelcoming alternatives, which may involve a conflict of moral values, and it is not clear which choice will be the right one” (Banks, 2012). Ethical dilemmas can occur in the context of either client or organisational-related conflict situations at work.

Underlying assumptions: empathy is a powerful tool that humans have and can be effective in client progress

Despite social workers best efforts to keep their feelings in check and to respect differences, being confronted with situations in which their values and morals conflict with those of their clients is a common scenario. For example, one may feel uncomfortable dealing with clients because of his or her sexual orientation. This issue arises because of the practitioner’s religious affiliation which results in the practitioner being unable to accept homosexuality. Another example, a pregnant client, ask her pro-life social worker for help obtaining an abortion. As the act of abortion conflicts with the social workers’ values, they may feel torn. And instead, they may wish to encourage the client to choose another alternative. Hence, in such cases, the practitioners faced the struggle between balancing their own value systems and their professional obligation as a social worker.

In the social work profession, it is a requirement to have a thorough understanding of ethics and some of the ethical dilemmas that one can face. On my journey as a social work student one of my assignments was specific to ethical dilemmas. The ethical dilemma that I chose to write in this paper about was multiple relationships and violating counselor client boundaries. The class that I wrote this in was HMS 102 which was values of human services. The main topic of the paper focused on the negative effects of sexual relationships. It also discussed crossing boundaries with clients and having other relationships such as friendships or other kinds of attachments to the client. In my field placement at Hardin Memorial Hospital social workers may have to be carful not to cross boundaries with clients especially in such a small town in which you may possibly know or know of a client.

The person is always a central axis in the process of social work. A person who becomes a client of the social worker is unique, his life history is unrepeatable. When a professional social worker affiliates a relationship with his client, he knows that his personality is violated, so they together have to try to restore a mutual beneficiary interaction between this person and the society. A social worker can accomplish this purpose just if his activity is conducted by highest values. In the activities of a social worker who is creating a relationship of helping the main aim is to reach personal respect for a person and his dignity. The social worker firstly has to stimulate the

Besides building rapport, the social worker’s interview style is important. A social work interview should consist primarily of open-ended questions as it encourages clients to elaborate on their responses. Social workers should also establish they understand the client 's replies by asking follow-up questions to acknowledge the client 's comments and encourage them to continue (Williams, n.d.). Upon reflecting on the interview process, I felt that I failed to achieve this. Because I realised that some parts of my interview lack the depth that I was hoping to achieve. I think that the main reason would be that I was impatient as my concern was to finish the interview

How might empathy help others or societies? “Empathy is about standing in someone else 's shoes, feeling with his or her heart, seeing with his or her eyes. Not only is empathy hard to outsource and automate, but it makes the world a better place” (Daniel H.Pink). This is what empathy is. Empathy is really important to make the world actually work well. Having empathy for another can change everything. It can help a person it can help a whole country it helps people be better it helps you learn about other. You learn about their situations and how their life actually is so you don 't have to actually cause any harm to them. Empathy is what helps humans prevail from other animals. If we don 't learn to use empathy we will not be superior to any other animals. In the English class this year we have studied empathy through short stories, Articles, and Novels like the story by Elie Wiesel. Empathy can create a stronger and more just society by others starting to see themselves in someone else 's situation and making others treat others fairly. This will be portrayed through the assignments, “The Lottery”, Kitty Genovese article, and Holocaust photo reflection.

Nowadays, it is not easy to describe professional work and never talk about ethical principles and values that guide it (Guttmann, 2006). Social work because it is a profession it has its own principles and values that guide its ethical conduct. In addition, Guttmann (2006) argues that the knowledge and skills we have acquired as social workers cannot guarantee an ethical conduct in practice alone. Ethical conduct is an important aspect of social work practice. It involves following and respecting the rules or standards for right conduct, especially the standards of a profession. A professional social worker who has a good ethical conduct must act in ways consistent with what the profession, society and individuals typically think are good values. Ethical behaviour in social work tends to involve demonstrating respect for key principles that the profession upholds. This paper seeks to critically discuss the importance of ethical conduct in professional social work practice. In doing so, I will explain the philosophical principles that guide ethical conduct in social work. Examples will be used to illustrate this.