Hy Resnick

Electronic technology and rehabilitiation: A computerized simulation game for youthful offenders

Summary Advantages to the use of the personal computer for simulation gaming are presented in this article. One therapeutic simulation game in particular, BUSTED, is discussed in detail. BUSTED was designed to reduce antisocial behavior in youthful offenders. Making choices and receiving the consequences of these decisions form the primary educational method for achieving this goal. This article details how BUSTED is played. Conclusions about the impact of BUSTED have not been reached. However, an extensive evaluation program has been planned to provide information regarding its effectiveness. A preliminary evaluation done in two high school classrooms yielded positive results.

A Comparative Analysis of Organization Development and Social Work, with Suggestions for What Organization Development can do for Social Work

This article compares two human service professions-social work and organization development-on a number of dimensions, including values, ethics, theories, practice skills, and client systems. Sufficient similarities (and distinct differences) emerged from this analysis to indicate the utility of social work incorporating organization development technologies into administrative social work practice and education. It is suggested that such inclusion can strengthen the capacity of social work administrators to make the organizational changes needed to adapt to the changing social conditions of the 1990s.

Better Listening: Paraphrasing and Perception Checking–A Study of the Effectiveness of a Multimedia Skills Training Program

SUMMARY The authors describe a multimedia communications skills training CD-ROM for human service students and practitioners and evaluate its effectiveness with undergraduate social work students in Canada.

Introduction to Technology for Social Work Practice

• The designers/authors had produced software (text based mostly) for human services purposes in the past and so their current work represents the progress that technology has made in our field. These designers/authors are the second stage innovators whose work needs to be recorded. • These programs are being used by professional helpers and are actually employed in various human service programs to support practice (software programs described in the first edition were mostly demonstration models). • Some of the software programs included had been subjected to increasingly rigorous and formal evaluations, the outcomes of

Introduction to Technology in Education

This section contains eight articles which describe how electronic technology is increasingly being utilized in the human service education class and workshop setting. There are a number of ways to use electronic technology to support or enhance human service instructional work, only three of which will be included in this edition: (1) Web-Based Courses, (2) Distance Learning,1 and (3) CD-ROM/Videodisc. Web-Based Courses and Distance Learning are similar modes of electronic technology, and share many of the same characterizations or requirements:

Busted: A Digital Group Game to Help At-Risk Youth Stay out of Jail

Originally developed in board format, Busted--Its Up to You is a video game designed to help at-risk youth in institutional settings gain greater self-awareness, recognize the consequences of their actions, and make better, more productive life choices.