Date of Conferral

11-7-2025

Date of Award

November 2025

Degree

Doctor of Social Work (DSW)

School

Social Work

Advisor

Yvonne Chase

Abstract

Social workers with high work demands and low resources are likely to experience burnout. The specific social work practice-focused research problems that were addressed in this project were job demands, available resources, and perceptions of burnout in child welfare social workers. The focus was on burnout in social work practice from the perspectives of child welfare social workers providing services to justice-involved children with aggressive behaviors. The practice-focused research questions for this project concerned the participants’ descriptions of job demands and employer-provided resources and their feelings of burnout when working with justice-involved youth who have aggressive behaviors. Bakker and Demerouti’s job demands–resources model underpinned this study. A basic qualitative design was used. The participants were 10 child welfare social workers in the state of Ohio who were employed in their field for at least 3 years and provided direct services to justice-involved youth exhibiting aggressive behaviors aged 12–17 years; they were chosen through snowball and purposive sampling. Findings showed that participants perceived high levels of blame and responsibility placed on them, a lack of collaboration, and inequal job responsibilities among colleagues. There was a lack of support for these workers on all levels, meaning from other professionals and the agency. The participants felt they are unprepared for their job responsibilities, and there was a notable difference between the perspectives of seasoned and amateur workers. Results from this project may promote positive social change by providing insights into self-care and policy change that stakeholders can use to help retain social workers working in child welfare.

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