Chaya Schwartz

Students' Attitudes to the Inclusion of People with Disabilities in the Community

This study measures and compares the attitudes of students studying different subjects to the inclusion of people with mental retardation and mental illness in the community. The Community Living Attitude Scale (comprising the four subscales of Empowerment, Exclusion, Sheltering, and Similarity) was administered to a random sample of 149 Israeli college freshmen and women (social work: n = 43: law: n = 24; natural science: n = 42; and social science: n = 40). Overall, the students endorse Empowerment and perceive the Similarity of persons with disabilities to themselves more than they agree with the Exclusion attitude of segregating persons with disabilities from community life. Social work students showed more positive inclusion attitudes to people with disabilities than other students. Students were more likely to endorse Exclusion for people with mental illness than for people with mental retardation.

Parents of Children With Chronic Disabilities: The Gratification of Caregiving

A sample of 167 parents of children with a mental illness or physical disability participated in the study. Parents reported receiving gratification from fulfilling their parental duties and from learning about themselves. The childs and parents personal characteristics were significant predictors of gratification. Physical disability and younger age of the child were associated with higher level of gratification, as were the younger age of the parent, unemployment, and parental poor health. When parents perceived caregiving as causing less emotional strain (low subjective burden), they were more likely to express gratification. The amount of assistance that the parent gave the child (objective burden) did not have a unique contribution to parental gratification.

Empowering the Disabled: A Multidimensional Approach.

This article explores empowerment among the disabled as a crucial element in promoting change among families and individuals who are at risk. Individuals with disabilities in Israel who provided volunteer work in organizations for the disabled were surveyed in relation to three components of empowerment: (a) family, (b) services, and (c) community. Three organizational factors (patterns of activity in organization, representation of the disabled and participation in decision-making) and two personal factors (self-esteem and mastery) affect at least one of the empowerment components.

Self‐appraised lifestyle satisfaction of persons with intellectual disability: the impact of personal characteristics and community residential facilities

The present study addresses two goals: (a) to examine the impact of personal characteristics, behavioural characteristics, and living arrangement on participants’ self‐appraised lifestyle satisfaction (LS), and (b) to compare the level of LS across different settings and to try to answer the question of whether the living arrangement made a contribution to general LS independent of residents’ personal and behavioural characteristics. A total of 247 adults with intellectual disability, randomly selected from residents of group homes, semi‐independent and independent apartments in the community, participated in the study. Residents were interviewed about their LS. The instrument that was used is the lifestyle satisfaction scale (LSS). Residents’ personal and behavioural characteristics explained more of the variance of total LS than the living arrangement. Among the personal and behavioural variables, only need for mobility assistance and level of challenging behaviour predicted LS. Participants who did not need mobility assistance or had less problem behaviour expressed markedly higher lifestyle satisfaction. Living in a semi‐independent apartment made a significant and independent contribution to the total lifestyle satisfaction over and above the contribution made by personal and behavioural characteristics. However, participants who did not live in a semi‐independent apartment expressed more lifestyle satisfaction than those who did.

Parents Caring for Adult Children with Physical Disabilities: The Impact of Hope and Closeness on Caregiving Benefits

In the present study, we examined 82 parents of adult children with physical disabilities. The parents described the benefits of caregiving, and reported positive feelings about their involvement in caregiving as well as a sense of personal growth as a result of caregiving. When parents perceived caregiving as causing less emotional strain (subjective burden), and when they felt higher levels of closeness with their offspring and expressed higher levels of hope, they were more likely to indicate that caregiving yielded benefits. In the discussion, we focus on the importance of developing closeness and hope among parents who care for their adult offspring with physical disabilities. The implications for social work intervention are also discussed.

Women Pursuing Higher Education in Ultra-Orthodox Society

The study reported in this article concerns the beginnings of higher education for women in the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) enclave in Israel. Haredi Jews are a self-secluded fundamentalist group committed to particularly strict interpretation of Jewish religious law. In recent years, they have been compelled by poverty and other factors to allow academic education, hitherto considered out of bounds, especially for women. Focus groups with 32 Haredi women enrolled in the social work program at the Haredi College in Jerusalem reveal the obstacles the women encountered both from conservative forces in the community and from within themselves as well as the means that they used to cope with them.

The Attitudes of Social Work Students and Practicing Psychiatric Social Workers Toward the Inclusion in the Community of People with Mental Illness

Abstract This study measured and compared the attitudes of social work students and practicing psychiatric social workers to the inclusion in the community of people with mental illness. The Community Living Attitude Scale Mental Illness (comprising the four subscales of Empowerment, Exclusion, Sheltering, and Similarity) was administered to a random sample of 68 Israeli BA social work students (first year: n = 35; third year: n = 33) and 28 practicing psychiatric social workers. Overall, the participants endorsed Empowerment and perceived the Similarity of persons with mental illness to themselves more than they agreed with the Exclusion attitude of segregating those persons from community life. First-year students rated Empowerment and Similarity significantly lower than did the third-year students and rated Sheltering significantly higher than did psychiatric social workers. Psychiatric social workers did not differ from third-year students and did not have stronger attitudinal commitment to the inclusion paradigm. They differed from first-year students only in the sheltering attitude; they showed lower support for sheltering people with mental illness.

Social Work Studies at a Haredi Women's College: Difficulties and Dilemmas

This paper examines the challenges faced by female Ultra-Orthodox students in a social work program designed for the Ultra-Orthodox community in Israel. Findings were obtained from four focus groups with a total of 32 students. The participants reported being exposed to contents that were inconsistent with the perspectives of their community, fieldwork expectations and requirements that violated strict rules of gender separation, and inconvenient scheduling of exams and field trips that did not take their religious observances into consideration. Despite the considerable distress that these matters caused, most of the students made determined efforts to cope, to learn the course material, to carry out their fieldwork assignments, and to reconcile the discrepancies between some of the contents they learned and behaviors that were expected of them and their deeply held values and ways. Implications of the findings are discussed and recommendations made.