This paper will address the interventions that social workers employ in the service of caregivers of people diagnosed with Serious and Persistent Mental Illnesses. It explores if certain demographics of the caregiver should guide the type of intervention social workers utilize when providing caregiver support.
Introduction
A. Caregiving. The act of caregiving is not unfamiliar, but the term “caregiving” is relatively new, with the first recorded use of the word in 1966 (Caregiving, 2010). Sixty-five million Americans, which comprise 29% of the United States (U.S.) population, have served as unpaid family caregivers to an adult or a child (Caregiving in the United States, 2009). Caregiving is multi-dimensional. For example, family caregiving, …show more content…
A perspective first formulated by psychologist John Bowlby (1907–1990) that is primarily concerned with early emotional bonds between children and their adult caregivers. The central tenet of attachment theory is that caregivers who are available and responsive to their child’s needs establish a sense of security in the child as she/he develops. The child knows that the caregiver is dependable and this creates a secure base from which the child can move out to explore the wider world (Bowlby, 1969/1982) Attachment theory has sometimes been interpreted in social work as suggesting that attachment is an early once-and-for-all event whose absence justifies permanent removal of a child from a caregiver. There is now widespread recognition that attachment is a more complex and on-going process so that if there is a break in the formation of attachment, even early in a child’s life, it should not be necessarily assumed to mean that attachment will not develop (Mikulincer, …show more content…
People with mental illnesses were increasingly placed in quasi-institutions like, group homes, halfway houses and apartments authorized by State mental health departments. Many others were and continue to be re-institutionalized by and different governmental department, the criminal justice system.
In a 2006 Special Report, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) estimated that 705,600 mentally ill adults were incarcerated in state prisons, 78,800 in federal prisons and 479,900 in local jails. This is more than the 559,000 institutionalized in 1960 (Lamb & Weinberger, 1998). Some argue that "people with mental illnesses are overrepresented in probation and parole populations at estimated rates ranging from two to four times the general population" (Prins and Draper, 2009, p11). This historical context is significant to social work because it contributes to an understanding of the modern day struggle of caregivers providing assistance to someone with a serious and persistent mental illness. It also demonstrated the necessity for social work to help the caregivers of the mentally ill resolve their caregiver issues so they may continue to serve this population within their natural support system. The application of social learning theory explains some of the difficulties in the modern day caregiving of this