Critical Thinking and Professional Judgement for Social Work

Lynne Rutter, Keith Brown

• Publisher: Learning Matters
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781526466983
• Edition: 5
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Work
• Index: Social Sciences

Critical thinking can appear formal and academic, far removed from everyday life where decisions have to be taken quickly in less than ideal conditions. It is, however, a vital part of social work, and indeed any healthcare and leadership practice.

Taking a pragmatic look at the range of ideas associated with critical thinking, this Fifth Edition continues to focus on learning and development for practice. The authors discuss the importance of sound, moral judgement based on critical thinking and practical reasoning, and its application to different workplace situations; critical reflection, and its importance to academic work and practice; and the connection between critical thinking ideas and professionalism.

Chapter 1 Who is this book for and how can it help?

This book is written primarily for post-qualifying and post-registration learners who are developing their practice expertise. However, we would argue that there are a number of ways in which critical thinking, particularly when associated with reflection and experiential learning, becomes an essential part of learning and development on any pre or post qualifying academic programme, and for many areas of work-based continuing professional development.

How can this book help with learning?

As mentioned in the Introduction, professional health and social care education is continually being influenced by policy and reform, but the continuing development of sound critical thinking, professional reasoning and judgement remains a priority. The ability to think critically can, therefore, be seen to be embedded within a range of formal and informal assessment standards, and within professional requirements.

Academic programmes

Criteria such as working in complex situations, exercising powers and responsibilities, managing risk and making informed decisions are listed as generic final-year undergraduate assessment standards, and are developed further at master’s level to include aspects such as creativity, insight and advanced independent thinking (QAAHE, 2008). These qualities involve various cognitive skills and abilities associated with critical thinking – for example, critical analysis, critical reflection, sound reasoning and evaluation. Developing critical thinking abilities and attributes can, therefore, help students extract, express and evaluate the learning and professional development occurring during their studies, placements and/or work-based practice.

Continuing professional development (CPD)

Professionals continue to learn and develop throughout their careers in order to keep their skills and knowledge up to date, and to be able to work safely, legally and effectively. This learning and development can be regulated by, or at least guided by, the use of professional requirements. These professional requirements will usually make reference to the need to improve and enhance levels of thinking within and for practice.

In the social work arena at present, the Professional Capabilities Framework (PCF) is an overarching professional standards framework which, under three ‘superdomains’ of purpose, practice and impact, contains nine domains representing the knowledge, skills and values that social workers need to practise effectively and which help to structure and guide their CPD and career activities (British Association of Social Workers, 2018). It sets out consistent expectations of social workers at every stage in their career from initial social work education to continuing professional development well after qualification. At present, across the nine PCF domains (or areas) there are nine levels of development (see Appendix), from beginning social worker education to a strategic level of practice. Within each level distinct capabilities have been identified that practitioners are expected to evidence with each domain.

It can be seen that many of the domains include elements of critical thinking. For example, Domain 2 (focusing on values and ethics) states that social workers have an obligation to conduct themselves ethically and to engage in ethical decision-making, including through partnership with people who use their services. Domain 6 focuses on applying the principles of critical thinking and reasoned discernment. This domain identifies the principles of critical thinking and reasoned discernment (augmented by creativity and curiosity) in order to identify, distinguish, evaluate and integrate multiple sources of formal and informal knowledge and evidence. Domain 7 (intervention and skills) focuses on the use of professional judgement, to employ a range of interventions.

In addition, progression between levels on the PCF is characterised by development of people’s ability to manage complexity, risk, ambiguity and increasingly autonomous decision making across a range of situations, and would need to be demonstrated as ‘evidence’ of professional development for various circumstances. A suggested issue for consideration here is: the quality of the judgements made, and the level of ability to explain and justify them. In this respect, critical thinking and professional judgement can be seen to be the underpinning and embedded abilities within and across such ‘assessment’ processes and structures. We therefore recognise critical thinking as a generic quality, and for this reason have not specifically connected the chapters within this text to any particular domains of the PCF. However, it is important for individuals, and indeed any educators, to ensure that appropriate links are made between the sections of this book, critical thinking development needs and appropriate PCF or other professional standard domains and competences.

Throughout their career, therefore, social work practitioners are required to demonstrate integration of all aspects of learning, and provide a sufficiency of evidence across all nine domains, which are seen as being interdependent. At the time of writing the first step in CPD for newly qualified social workers is the Assessed and Supported Year in Employment (ASYE) level. Following on, the Department of Education’s Post Qualifying Standards – the Knowledge and Skills Statements (KSS) - are the foundation for the introduction of a post-qualification specialist career pathway for adult social workers, child and family social workers, and for practice leaders.

Healthcare professional values are mainly driven by the relevant professional bodies, for example, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) and the British Medical Association (BMA). These bodies, along with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) have associated CPD standards and criteria for continuing registration for conduct, performance and ethics, where critical thinking abilities and qualities can again be explicitly recognised or more implicitly implied. In this respect, an understanding of where critical thinking sits within relevant professional requirements should help practitioners identify, evaluate and articulate essential learning and development.

How can this book help with practice?

As practitioners we are expected to take professional responsibility for our own and others’ CPD, but employers are also expected to play their part in fostering a culture which values learning and development across the organisation, e.g. providing resources, time and access to learning and research, together with appropriate supervision or other types of support. The role of leadership in developing and supporting learning cultures is apparent here. A wide range of learning and development activities and opportunities, including in-house training, use of feedback and colleagues’ advice, supervision, reflection, case discussion and formal programmes, need to be systematically recorded and recognised as contributing to professional CPD. The need for reliable assessment of this learning output and impact on practice is also apparent, in order to ensure appropriate evidencing for career progression and professional development or training needs appraisal. Well-led and supportive work-based learning environments play a key role here.

As Rolfe et al. (2011) show, developing practice and learning is difficult to separate. The development of practice is an ongoing activity; it generates experiential knowledge and so to practise is also to learn. The process and outcomes of continuing learning, when meaningfully achieved, will almost naturally embed themselves into processes of working – for example, with more reliable thinking, clearer writing and deeper reflection. Appropriate evaluation of this learning and its impact on practice can ensure that the outputs are fully recognised, recorded and accredited where necessary.

The most important learning, however, is meta-learning – that is, learning about how we learn – and this is the basis of lifelong learning. This handbook, therefore, also focuses on learning as an end in itself and makes critical thinking and practice an integrated way of continuing to develop.

Any profession has always demanded critical abilities and qualities from its practitioners because decisions have to be made ‘on the spot’ and under pressure. With health and social care practice situations being particular complex arenas, the consequences of any judgements, decisions and action are extremely important, and so the need for critical thinking is ever present. The practitioner is working with uncertainty, risk, diversity and difference in a way that recognises oppression, and works to empower and promote the needs and rights of patients, service users and carers. This requirement goes beyond ‘competent practice’ and demands ‘critical practice’ (Adams et al., 2009), and the development of ‘critical being’, i.e. a person who not only reflects critically on knowledge but also develops their powers of critical self-reflection and critical action (Barnett, 1997). This book can therefore be used as a series of steps (working at your own pace) to gaining confidence and proficiency in critical thinking and writing skills, as well as reflection for professional development. As learners working in complex and stressful situations our first priority should be to ourselves and our health, remembering to exercise self-care with the aid of others where necessary.

No matter what we do we cannot escape our thinking but it can often be left unquestioned in our busy lives. We suggest that developing critical thinking can ensure that we use the ‘best’ thinking we are capable of in any set of circumstances in order to continually refine our professional judgement and expertise.

Chapter 2 Critical thinking: some general principles

Aspects of critical thinking are apparent when you consider, deliberate, analyse, assess, make decisions or judgements, and discuss or debate issues with others, so most practitioners have plenty of skills and experience to build on. We are, therefore, not aiming to teach or present a set of separate techniques but to start you working with some relevant generic ideas and principles which can develop your own style of critical thinking further.

We do not intend to cover the full range of critical thinking ‘skills’ (indeed, this would consider them to be something like a checklist, which is inappropriate for practice) but instead highlight a few basic principles to underpin the process of enhancing the critical aspects of your own learning and development.

What’s it all about?

Brookfield (1987) shows that critical thinking is a lived and creative activity, not an academic pastime.

Being a critical thinker involves more than cognitive activities such as logical reasoning or scrutinising arguments for assertions unsupported by empirical evidence. Thinking critically involves our recognising the assumptions underlying our beliefs and behaviours. It means we can give justifications for our ideas and actions. Most important, perhaps, it means we try to judge the rationality of these justifications. We can do this by comparing them to a range of varying interpretations and perspectives.

(Brookfield, 1987, pp13–14)

Chatfield’s (2018) more recent definition takes a learning approach.

The art of critical thinking isn’t about changing human nature, or pretending we can or should act entirely rationally all the time. It’s about learning to recognize our own - and others’ – limitations; and knowing when to pause, think again and reach for the right questions in order to work out what is really going on.

(Chatfield, 2018, p.6)

Thinking critically can therefore result in major shifts in our ways of thinking and the development of a certain amount of reflective scepticism, i.e. when nothing is regarded as a universal truth, or taken on trust any more. Our assumptions and beliefs, the views of others and existing structures all start to be questioned, no matter what their basis or authority. Such thinking also means becoming more objective, i.e. being able to set aside our immediate feelings and preferences as much as possible (Chatfield, 2018). It is powerful and transformative stuff and the challenge can be extremely positive.

However, critical thinking can also feel threatening, provoke anxiety and create adverse reactions from other people. It is hard work, involving self-doubt and mental blocks, but for many it leads to more creative leaps and insights. If you find yourself being adversely affected by the negative aspects, we advise you to seek support.

Critical thinking should not produce cynics but confident people who can be committed to a point of view that is well informed, rational and supported by relevant and valid material for that situation, and who are also open to other ideas. This involves learning to know yourself better in order to think better.

How can it be achieved?

Because people vary according to their capacities, abilities and experience, how you think critically will be personal to you. To develop this individuality we need an appropriate theory to provide us with valid and useful goals, methods and outcomes, i.e. an underpinning framework and structure. We propose to initially approach the ‘how’ in our context by using an established theory of Bailin et al. (1999), who suggest that the critical thinker can be thought of in terms of a set of ‘requisite intellectual resources’. These ideas have also been used successfully by Ford et al. (2004, 2005) in their research on criticality with students in social work education, and are explored below.

The intellectual resources for critical thinking are:

• background knowledge;
• critical concepts;
• critical thinking standards;
• strategies;
• habits of mind.

We will look at each of these resources in turn and examine their components, why they are thought to be necessary, and where and how they might be of use. We can also identify the ones we need to develop further.

Background knowledge of the situation in question

Bailin et al. (1999, p290) propose that:

the depth of knowledge, understanding and experience persons have in a particular area of study or practice is a significant determinant of the degree to which they are capable of thinking critically in that area.

In other words, the more you know about a situation and the context in which it sits, the better. This includes existing concepts, beliefs, values and ways of acting, as well as the usual background information which helps clarif...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Acknowledgements
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Foreword: a series to support post-qualifying social work
• About the authors
• Preface to the fifth edition
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Who is this book for and how can it help?
• Chapter 2 Critical thinking: some general principles
• Chapter 3 Professional judgement
• Chapter 4 Using knowledge in practice
• Chapter 5 Critical reflection
• Chapter 6 Writing reflective academic assignments
• Chapter 7 Developing critical practice
• Chapter 8 Continuing learning: a critical approach
• Conclusion
• Appendix Professional Capabilities Framework
• References
• Index