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Suite 104 # 7402
Berkeley, CA 94720-7402
Phone: 510-643-7026
Fax: 510-643-7019

2339 Haste Street
Berkeley, CA 94704
Phone: 510-642-6658

Email: ccyp@berkeley.edu

Dissertation Award Winners for 2008-2009

An Assessment of Differential Response: Implications for Social Work Practice in Diverse Communities

Amy Conley

This dissertation examines a child maltreatment prevention program implemented in three neighborhoods in Alameda County. The program model, differential response, provides families with voluntary, strengths-based services through weekly home visitation and referrals to local resources such as childcare. Using a mixed methods design, the research addresses community aspects of the program’s implementation, outcomes for children and families, and staff and parent experiences with service delivery. The first stage of the dissertation research involved the collection and analysis of qualitative data, including in-person interviews with all program administrators, focus groups with line staff, and telephone interviews with current clients. For the second stage, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software was used to collect and interpret data on the availability of social services to which clients can be connected and survival analysis was conducted to examine client outcomes with reference to a comparison group. The study addresses several gaps in existing literature, including the lack of research on differential response in the California context and neighborhood-level factors that might influence the success of the model. Findings from this research are being used to develop an evidence-informed curriculum to train masters of social work students on how to provide differential response services.

Learning and Legislating to Love: Government-Sponsored Relationship Education and the Modern Marriage Crisis

Jennifer Randles

In 2001, President George Bush created the Healthy Marriage Initiative (HMI) as part of the Administration for Children and Families to promote marriage, reduce divorce, and thereby increase the number of children raised in healthy two-parent families. The policy earmarked $150 million dollars annually in federal seed money to support community-based relationship, marriage, and parenting education programs that teach youth and adults how to value marriage and communicate and resolve conflict more effectively within family relationships. There is currently no in-depth qualitative research available that explores who is involved in these programs, what ideas and interests motivate their involvement, or what specifically is taught in government-sponsored relationship skills programs and how participants respond to these messages. In an effort to address this gap, my dissertation entails a three-pronged research design that includes textual analysis of the most commonly used relationship skills curricula in HMI programs, participant observation in HMI-sponsored courses, and in-depth interviews with HMI-funded educators and program participants. This qualitative research design will offer an in-depth picture of how the HMI as national public policy is implemented at the community level and in the classroom.