Special Section: Science in Social Work Roundtable
Research on Social Work Practice
A Science of Social Work, and Social Work
as an Integrative Scientific Discipline: Have
We Gone Too Far, or Not Far Enough?
John S. Brekke1
Abstract
There are two purposes to this article. The first is to update the science of social work framework. The second is to use recent
discussions on the nature of realist science and on social work science to propose a definition of social work as an integrative
scientific discipline that complements its definition as a profession.
Keywords
evidence-based practice, methodological article
This article has two purposes. The first is to update the science
of social work (SoSW) framework I have proposed (Brekke,
2011, 2012). The second is to use recent discussions on the
nature of realist science (e.g., Bunge, 1988, 2009a, 2009b) and
on social work science (Sommerfeld, 2014) to propose a defi-
nition of social work as an integrative scientific discipline that
complements its definition as a profession.
The SoSW-Redux
The SoSW framework has core domains, core constructs, and
aesthetic characteristics (Brekke, 2012). The three core con-
structs are biopsychosocial, person-in-environment (PiE), and
service systems for change. The first two can be seen as consti-
tutive of the social in social work, and the third reflects the
work that is essential to social work practice. These pro-
posed constructs were intended to be essential but not exhaus-
tive. Concepts such as ecological and social justice are also
essential to social work and will be considered in light of the
proposed framework. This first section of this article will focus
on two revisions to the domains of the SoSW framework. The
first revision concerns the concepts in the domains, and the sec-
ond is on the population facets of the domains (see Figure 1).
This discussion retains the conceptual background of three rea-
list notions that infuse a SoSW: levels of reality, emergence,
and upward and downward causation that were discussed in
Brekke (2012).
Figure 1 shows the proposed changes to the concepts in the
domain framework. Specifically, the word disease has now
been replaced with the word disfunction.1 The term well-
being has also been added to the term health, so that the John S. Brekke, School of Social Work, University of Southern California, Los
concept is well-being and health. The meaning of these
changes is elaborated below.
2014, Vol. 24(5) 517523
The Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/1049731513511994
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Disfunction is a broader term that represents more than dis-
ease as a medical construct. It rests on and implies the notion of
functioning that is central to how social work has defined its
scope for many decades (Barker, 1995; Gibelman, 1999;
National Association of Social Work [NASW], 2008). When
disfunction is combined with the core constructs of PiE and
biopsychosocial, it specifies multiple elements and levels to the
phenomena we target in social work, such as an individuals
cognitive, emotional and social functioning, family function-
ing, marital functioning, the functioning of community envir-
onments, and institutional performance. Functioning, as
opposed to disease, gives the required breadth that reflects a
social work focus. Therefore, in our science, we seek to under-
stand and reduce disfunction on multiple levels using models of
understanding and change that feature interactions between
social and individual factors that have been historically central
to social work (Gibelman, 1999; NASW, 2008). This interac-
tion between social and individual factors was central to the
models of change and understanding advocated in Brekke
(2012), and they remain essential to the revised framework.
But while social work has a long tradition of ameliorating
disfunction and suffering, it also has had a long-standing focus
on identifying strengths and supporting positive functioning at
multiple levels (NASW, 2008). The terms health and well-
being are meant to capture this focus. Health has been defined
1
School of Social Work, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA,
USA
Corresponding Author:
Angeles, CA 90089, USA.
Email: brekke@usc.edu
518
The Domains of a science of social work
To understand: Change strategies for:
Marginalizaon Empowerment
Disenfranchisement Inclusion
Individual social
Reducing disfuncon
factors in disfuncon
Individual social Increasing well being and health
factors in well being and health
Figure 1. The domains of a science of social work.
by the World Health Organization (WHO, 1948) as . . . a state
of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not
merely the absence of disease or infirmity. While this defini-
tion has generated controversy, it has endured (Bircher, 2005;
Callahan, 1973; Saracci, 1997). It contains two aspects that are
particularly relevant to social work. First, it includes mental
and social aspects of being, and second, it is an aspiration in
seeking complete well-being and health rather than incremental
approximations.
There are multiple definitions of well-being (Dodge, Daly, &
Sanders, 2012; Jayawickreme, Frogeard, & Seligman, 2012),
and other terms such as wellness and quality of life also organizations, communities, and societies. For example, we
appear prominently in the literature (Barwais, 2011; Corbin &
Pangrazi, 2001; Theofilou, 2013). In surveying this literature, the
following definitional model is proposed (see Figure 2).
In this model, well-being is a set of characteristics derived
from previous work (Barwais, 2011; Jayawickreme et al.,
2012) that reflect the behavioral qualities of (i) proactive agency
and empowerment, (ii) emotional balance, (iii) prosocial beha-
vior, and (iv) personal thriving and optimizing. Wellness and
health are states of being, and quality of life is an evaluative out-
come that often consists of both objective and subjective assess-
ments of ones position in life in multiple areas such as the fiscal/
economic, physical, psychological, occupational, and environ-
mental (Theofilou, 2013). Since well-being and health yield
quality of life, these two constructs are seen as the fundamental
drivers relevant to a SoSW framework.
The WHO definition of health was shown above, and it rep-
resents physical, mental, and social aspects of life that are cen-
tral to the mission of social work. WHO defines wellness as the
optimal state of health of individuals and groups. These con-
cepts are quite synonymous, with health being the central
construct.
The proposed definition of well-being outlines functional
characteristics that are central to a healthy life and that are
congruent with social work values. Emotional balance sug-
gests that a range of typical human emotions is essential, and
when there is an overall balance between positive and nega-
tive emotion they reflect adjustment to lifes challenges. Pro-
social behavior highlights the significance of productive
social interactions for healthy functioning. Personal thriving
Research on Social Work Practice 24(5)
Model of Central Concepts in Well-being and Health
well-being health/wellness quality of life
behavioral characteristics states outcome
Figure 2. Model of central concepts in well-being and health.
and optimizing reflect the notion that human potential and
growth are core ingredients for promoting health and mean-
ingful activity. Finally, proactive empowerment and agency
constitute an approach to helping people gain control over
their own lives and exercise influence on their environments.
It is a process that fosters power in people for use in their own
lives, their communities, and in their society. Agency is a
notion from anthropology and it is an individual or collective
capacity for action in terms of self-consciousness and resis-
tance to power structures (Ahearn, 2001). Agency is the
capacity of individuals to act independently and to make their
own free choices. Taken as a whole, well-being as defined
here suggests essential functional characteristics congruent
with social work values and mission.
With some adjustments, we can apply these concepts in a
useful manner to other levels of social reality such as groups,
can understand the well-being of organizations that are proac-
tive and empowered, balanced in their essential qualities, pro-
social, and thriving. The capabilities model (Nussbaum, 2000;
Nussbaum & Sen, 1993) also has particular relevance to these
issues when analyzing societal well-being.
Overall, these changes to the concepts in the domains of
a SoSW are meant to more adequately reflect the core con-
structs and values of social work and to provide an
improved foundation for a SoSW. In addition to changes
in the concepts in the domain, it is important to develop
more fully two facets of the domains in the framework (see
Figure 2). The first facet concerns the two scientific aims of
understanding and change. The second facet concerns the
focus on subpopulations of the marginalized or disenfran-
chised, and on the general population. The bolded horizontal
line in Figure 1 is meant to illustrate this dual population
focus. Above the line is the focus on the marginalized and
disenfranchised that reflects a central commitment to social
justice. Below the line is the focus on the publics health
and well-being which is seen in the ecological context of
the interaction of individual and social factors within multi-
ple levels of reality (Brekke, 2012).
More than any other profession or field, social work reflects a
fundamental focus on models of understanding and change stra-
tegies for subpopulations who are marginalized and/or disenfran-
chised (Brekke, 2012). These subpopulations are a central feature
of social work, for example, the poor, the disabled, lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender (LGBT), immigrants, race/ethnicity/
culture, and their intersections (NASW, 2008). There are models
Brekke
for understanding the process of marginalization and disenfranch-
isement. The fields of economics, international development,
sociology, and anthropology sometimes use the construct of
social exclusion. It has involved the study of how individuals and
groups become marginalized or excluded with a focus on a multi-
level model of society and interactions among those levels (Fer-
guson, Gever, Minh-ha, & West, 1999; Hills, LeGrand, &
Piachaud, 2002; Murphy, 2005; Sen, 2000; Sen, 2005).
In an attempt to see what the social work literature reveals,
an abstract search was done of four social work journals from
1993present (20 years). The journals were Social Work,
Research on Social Work Practice, Social Work Research, and
Social Service Review. The key words were exclusion, margin-
alized, and disenfranchised, which resulted in about 90 articles
with one or more of these words in the abstract. In the articles,
these terms were almost exclusively used as nouns or adjec-
tives. In essence, we typically identify or describe these groups
in our literature; we take their existence as given in our social
structure. There was no study or articulation of a process of
marginalization, social exclusion, or disenfranchisement. This
poses a problem for a SoSW, for if we do not embrace this
focus of understanding, we will have little knowledge about
how these subpopulations arise, what causes them to occur,
or how the causal factors interact. Our research needs to move
beyond identifying and describing these vulnerable populations
to understanding the processes and causes that lead to their
emergence and ongoing existence. This will have direct rele-
vance to developing strategies to prevent or alter these social
processes and to intervening with these populations, both of
which are central to the mission of social work.
Concerning change strategies for populations that are mar-
ginalized or disenfranchised, the previous definitions of health
and well-being would suggest that the empowerment of indi-
viduals and groups is central to the SoSW. Social work change
strategies are constructed to reduce disfunction and to develop
well-being and health through growth, independence, interde-
pendence, and skill acquisition. This can be done through
self-help strategies, therapy, group work, and community orga-
nizing, while strategies for increasing inclusion can occur
through advocacy and policy practice, all of which are well
articulated in social work literature. Our science will, therefore,
focus on the rigorous development and effectiveness of these
change strategies using methods from intervention science (see
Fraser, Richman, Galinsky, & Day, 2009; Research on Social
Work Practice, #5 2010) and implementation science (see
Research on Social Work Practice, #5 2009).
The second population issue (below the bold line in Fig-
ure 1) concerns the general population focus or the publics
health. This is based on the notion that all individuals expe-
rience ruptures in their lives, careers, marriages, families,
institutions, and systems, and these ruptures receive a scien-
tific focus from social work in terms of understanding and
change strategies. The SoSW will focus on individuals,
groups, families, neighborhoods, organizations, commu-
nities with notions of health, and disfunction at all levels.
In terms of general population understanding, our science
519
focuses on how individual and social factors interact in pro-
ducing disfunction at multiple levels. At the individual
level, this disfunction may never become a diagnosable clin-
ical condition as in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders (DSM), but it can reflect considerable dis-
function and consequence. The V codes in DSM reflect
these problems in living that are a focus of attention while
not reaching a diagnostic threshold. But, importantly, the
lens of scientific understanding in social work is on how
individual and social factors interact to produce well-being
and health at multiple levels.
In terms of general population change strategies, our science
focuses on reducing disfunction through crisis intervention, indi-
vidual therapies, marital therapy, family therapy, school-based
interventions, child welfare, workplace interventions, and advo-
cacy. We also focus on increasing well-being and health through
prevention, psychoeducation, lifestyle and wellness skills, man-
agement development, organizational coaching, and advocacy.
There is research and practice literature in all of these areas from
social work practitioners and researchers.
The dual scientific focus in social work includes the general
case and the subpopulations. The professional and scientific
mission of social work with the subpopulations who are mar-
ginalized is inherent and manifest. The focus on the general
case, or the publics health, has been less well embraced and
articulated, but it is explicit in the NASW mission statement.
This combined population focus suggests an elaboration of the
scientific mission of social work that will be reflected in the
questions asked and the methods used.
These revisions and elaborations of the original SoSW
framework are the result of feedback from informal and orga-
nized discussions of this framework (e.g., Brekke & Marsh,
2013). As originally stated, the goal of the framework was to
generate discussion, controversy, and hopefully progress
through the refinement to this framework, or the generation
of other approaches altogether. However, even with this pro-
posed framework for a SoSW, there is another fundamental
issue that needs to be addressed: Can social work be a scientific
discipline?
Social Work as an Integrative
Scientific Discipline
Having refined the proposed framework for a SoSW, a second
issue concerns the implications of this framework (or any
SoSW framework) for how social work is defined. Specifically,
it is important to consider the question of whether we can
define social work as a scientific discipline. To do this, several
issues need to be addressed: (i) the definitions of a profession
and a scientific discipline; (ii) types of knowledge; (iii) types
of science; and (iv) supradisciplinary scientific activities. In
doing this, a distinction between core scientific disciplines and
integrative scientific disciplines will be proposed, and it will be
argued that social work should be defined both as a profession
and as an integrative scientific discipline.
520
Profession and Scientific Discipline defined
A profession has been defined as a paid occupation that involves
prolonged training and a formal qualification process based upon
a systematic and scientific body of knowledge and anchored
in the creation of legal boundaries (e.g., a scope of practice;
DallAlba, 2009). Social work has been defined as a profession
with a professional organization (NASW) educational certifica-
tion (Council on Social Work Education [CSWE]) and licensing
protocols that vary by state. This provides the definition and
sanctioning of the social work profession.
An academic scientific discipline is the organization of learn-
ing and the systematic production of new knowledge with sev-
eral features: (1) a particular object of research, (2) a body of
accumulated specialist knowledge referring to the object of
research, (3) theories and concepts that effectively organize the
accumulated specialist knowledge, (4) using specific terminolo-
gies adjusted to the research object, (5) using research methods
according to the disciplines specific research requirements, and
(6) institutional manifestation in the form of subjects taught at
universities or colleges, respective academic departments, and
associated professional organizations (Krishnan, 2009). While
most accredited schools of social work (or departments) reside
within universities, social work has not defined itself as a scien-
tific discipline. As I have argued, the place for research and sci-
ence in social work has been expanding (Brekke, 2012), but in
order to define social work as a scientific discipline, several
other considerations need to be addressed.
Types of Scientific Knowledge
Sommerfeld (2014) uses the work of Bunge (1988) and
defines three types of scientific knowledge: factual, nomolo-
gical, and technological. These types of knowledge are rele-
vant to how scientific disciplines are defined. Factual
knowledge concerns the products of observation and research.
For example, we know that the temperature at which water
boils varies based on altitude; or, there is the finding that
objective and subjective quality of life are only modestly
related in population studies (Cummins, 2000). These facts
are based on repeated observations in physics and sociologi-
cally oriented research.
Nomological knowledge concerns theories or laws that
describe and explain the relations between facts; it explains the
cohesion of an entity and the underlying mechanisms,
dynamics, or regularities in observed or latent phenomena.
Theories can be called nomological if they describe and explain
the regularities among related phenomena, reveal or construct
the underlying mechanisms that explain their operation, and
suggest why a mechanism does not work in all cases. For exam-
ple, the Ideal Gas Law provides an explanation (in the form of
an equation) of the relationship between waters boiling point
and altitude. In terms of objective and subjective quality of life,
the strength of the relationship between them has been deter-
mined to be nonlinear, moderated by extreme (low) living con-
ditions. The theoretical mechanism used to explain this is the
Research on Social Work Practice 24(5)
homeostatic control of subjective quality of life which makes
subjective and objective quality of life largely independent and
modestly related. However, this is interrupted by an objectively
low threshold of life condition that overrides the homeostatic
mechanism and thereby strengthens the relationship between
objective and subjective quality of life (Cummins, 2000). This
is nomological knowledge that concerns general laws or the
explanation of facts and phenomena of interest, which are
embedded in theories.
Finally, technological knowledge applies nomological
knowledge, or builds new knowledge, directly relevant to pro-
moting changes in life conditions. For example, technological
knowledge would concern building a device to promote boiling
water practices and sterilization of eating utensils to prevent
water-borne disease in different geographic locations; or,
developing and testing social interventions for improving
the quality of life for poor urban children. As Sommerfeld
(2014) suggests, technology is value laden and rests on the use
of factual and nomological knowledge for science that is action
oriented and aims to promote change (take action) in life situa-
tions. These types of knowledge are also reflected in different
types of scientific activity.
Types of Science
Bunge (1988) makes a distinction between basic science, applied
science, and technology that is relevant to our discussion. The
fundamental distinction is not in worldview, the mathematical
tools, or the rigor of the methods, since they all share those. The
basic distinction is in their aims. Basic science is concerned with
fundamental cognitive problems: the regularities and laws that
govern the phenomena of interest, whether that is molecules,
mammals, or economic models. The search is for theories and
models that represent progressively truer partial reconstructions
of reality (Bunge, 2009b). Bunge then argues that applied science
differs from basic science in three ways. First, the applied scientist
generates new knowledge by building on, enriching, and exploit-
ing the knowledge of basic science. Second, the focus of applied
science is narrower. Rather than studying basic human cognition,
the focus might be on cognitive patterns in different mental ill-
nesses. Third, applied science always has a potentially practical
target, even if it is long term and not immediately applicable. The
target might be the issue of forestation of particular trees, or
understanding compound interactions relevant to drug develop-
ment, or human learning mechanisms that could be relevant to
behavioral treatment development.
Technology is distinct from both basic and applied science.
The aim of technology is to control and change reality through
the design and use of artificial (constructed) systems and plans
of action based on scientific knowledge and methods. All tech-
nology involves invention of the artifact, rigorous testing of it,
implementation, and eventual dissemination. Applied to the
field of behavioral interventions, this would involve the the-
ories and methods of intervention science and implementation
science, as discussed above. Bunge (1985, cited in Sommer-
feld, 2014) also defines four criteria that a technology (for this
Brekke 521

Table 1. Defining Features of Core and Integrative Scientific Disciplines.

Defining Features Core Scientific Discipline Integrative Scientific Discipline

Types of knowledge factual, nomological factual, nomological, technological

Type of science
Supra-disciplinary activity
Technological focus
Academic lineage
Level of scientific rigor
basic or applied
primarily within discipline, but can participate in
supra-disciplinary activities
generally pre-technological and not essential
derived from historical academic disciplines
high
applied-technological
supra-disciplinary activities are central to science
and research, essential integrative focus
essential technological focus, problems in living
largely derived from professions
high

purpose, we will call the technology a treatment) has to ful-
fill: (a) it has to be based on verified theories that explain the
causal factors that lead to the emergence of a problem of con-
cern in a field of practice, (b) the treatment has to be described
and there has to be at least plausibility that this treatment
affects the causal factors, (c) a scientific explanation of how the
treatment affects the causal factors (how the treatment works)
is developed, and (d) the treatment has been proved effective.
This definition implies the use of rigorous scientific methods
and the combination of factual and nomothetic knowledge in
technology. The primary goal of technology is not to under-
stand the world but to actively use scientific methods to change
it in planful ways based on understandings revealed from basic
and applied science.
Describing the types of knowledge and science lays a criti-
cal foundation for defining social work as a scientific disci-
pline. However, there is also a growing awareness of the
importance of supradisciplinary scientific activity.
Supradisciplinary Scientific Activity
Recently, in social work and across many disciplines, there has
been an increasing focus on interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary,
and transdisciplinary research activity (e.g., Nurius & Kemp,
2012). It is being argued that a supradisciplinary team approach
to research and science can yield breakthroughs about complex
problems in basic or applied sciences and lead to technological
advances that could not come from a single discipline working in
isolation. The definitions of these supradisciplinary terms have
been debated, but here are summary attempts at defining them.
Multidisciplinary research is several academic disciplines
working in parallel from their disciplinary-specific individual
bases to address a shared problem. This could result in distinc-
tive approaches to a single problem. Interdisciplinary research
is several disciplines working jointly from their discipline-
specific bases integrating or combining perspectives, concepts,
and/or theories to address a common problem. Transdisciplinary
research is a collaboration between several academic disciplines
to address a complex problem. It requires that scientists trans-
cend their disciplinary boundaries to build a new approach made
up of novel concepts, theories, or methods that reflect this blend-
ing of perspectives (e.g., Hirsch et al., 2008; Rosenfeld, 1992).
While the nuances of these definitions might be more or less
relevant to the actual practice of shared disciplinary research, it
is clear that some of this work is more characteristic of basic
science, applied science, or technology. It is also clear that as
the problem focus becomes more applied and technological,
the focus on real-world problems and problems of living
becomes more acute.
Social Work as a Scientific Discipline
The coaptation of the four notions discussed above can be used to
propose a definition of core and integrative scientific disciplines
(see Table 1). The core scientific disciplines push a depth of sci-
ence within well-defined (and evolving) boundaries. For exam-
ple, sociology, psychology, economics, mathematics, physics,
chemistry, and biology are core scientific disciplines. These dis-
ciplines typically grow from the social science and natural science
departments in universities. The central issue is not solving prob-
lems in living but building a body of theory and research that tar-
gets the understanding of phenomena that the discipline defines as
central to their knowledge. In biology, one example would be cel-
lular mechanisms, from psychology it could be the mechanisms of
human learning, from sociology it could be group dynamics. Core
disciplines ask how to develop, refine, and test theory for under-
standing specific phenomena, and by necessity they are removed
from essential concerns about how this knowledge can be applied
to solving problems in living. These disciplines can be basic or
applied, and they focus primarily on factual and nomological
knowledge. For example, there is basic neuroscience and applied
neuroscience. Basic neuroscience has studied learning in sea
slugs and tries to isolate basic molecular mechanisms of learning
that might generalize to humans (Ho, Lee, & Martin, 2011).
Applied neuroscience, for example, generates insights about
learning patterns in mentally ill adults (Green & Junjhee, 2012).
In core disciplines, supradisciplinary activities can be done but
they are not essential or required. A technological focus is not
essential but can be used, for example, in clinical psychology to
develop treatments for mental disorders. High levels of scientific
rigor are essential to the core disciplines.
The integrative scientific disciplines, on the other hand, seek
to push disciplinary boundaries for solving problems in living.
The integrative disciplines are defined by their explicit focus on
the application of disciplinary knowledge in integrative ways,
applied to selected problems in living. Their focus is always
applied and technological. When this is done we have, for exam-
ple, medical science, social work science, public health, and
522
engineering. Integrative disciplines provide new applications of
theory to problems in life, the development of new integrative
theories and models that span disciplines and are based on the
foundation of strong disciplinary knowledge from core disciplin-
ary sciences. The integrative disciplines ask how we can use
existing theory, or create integrative theories, to guide us in sol-
ving critical problems in life. What is a critical problem is
defined by each integrative discipline. Supradisciplinary
research activity is a defining feature of the integrative sciences.
The integrative disciplines derive from and are often allied with
professions: for example, medicine, public health, social work,
business, occupational therapy, engineering, and nursing. This
provides the problems in living focus that distinguishes them
from the core disciplines. A final feature of the integrative scien-
tific disciplines is that they are essentially engaged in the worlds
they study. High levels of scientific rigor are essential to the Inte-
grative Disciplines, and the focus on engagement and problems
in living requires that a range of designs and methods be used to
deal with complex human interactions in situ.
It is important to note that the integrative scientific disci-
plines, like the core disciplines, will each have a distinct iden-
tity that is based on a framework of constructs, domains, and
characteristics as articulated in Brekke (2012, 2014; see Kaji-
kawa, 2008, for an example from sustainability science). While
the debate should continue as to whether we are moving in the
right direction with the proposed framework, being an integra-
tive scientific discipline is only one aspect of defining a SoSW.
A critical task is to continue to distinguish social work from
other integrative scientific disciplines.
In a somewhat parallel argument about the essential quali-
ties of social work as a scientific discipline, Sommerfeld
(2014) proposes that social work is a transdisciplinary action sci-
ence. He points out that most, if not all, other professions have
coevolved with a closely related scientific discipline. In the
United States, this includes, for example, medicine, nursing,
occupational therapy, and engineering (Brekke, 2012). He sug-
gests that an action science provides a blending of scientific
(technology) and practice knowledge considerations, which is
essential for sound professional action in social work. Further,
that it establishes . . . the construction of a professional knowl-
edge base as the main goal of a science of social work. While
there are some differences in focus and in the ways that we have
articulated and supported our positions on a SoSW, the funda-
mental proposition of social work as a scientific discipline links
the two approaches.
Another point is critical. This is not an argument for the disso-
lution of disciplinary boundaries or of disciplines themselves.
There are certain problems that can be best solved within a core
discipline, for example, mathematics, statistics, or psychology,
which require a depth of discipline-specific theoretical knowl-
edge and method. Core disciplines are also essential for the inte-
grative disciplines to thrive, and for interdisciplinary and
transdisciplinary scientific work to occur, make sense, and yield
progress. But problems in life, for example, how to ameliorate
poverty, provide clean water to third-world villages, or help juve-
niles in the justice system to rehabilitate, can best be solved using
Research on Social Work Practice 24(5)
integrative approaches that move knowledge from the core disci-
plines to the integrative disciplines, and build new scientific
knowledge within and across fields such as social work, medicine,
engineering, and public health.
The Definition of Social Work
This discussion provides a basis for arguing that social can be
defined as an integrative scientific discipline. Using the SoSW
framework proposed above, social work as an integrative sci-
ence has core constructs, domains, and essential characteristics
that distinguish it from other integrative sciences.
Therefore, using the propositions discussed above, the def-
inition of social work is 2-fold: (1) the social work profession
with trained and licensed social workers who apply a range of
theories and change strategies at the micro-, mezzo-, and macro
levels, with a focus on vulnerable populations as well as the
general well-being; (2) social work as an integrative scientific
discipline with domains, core constructs, and characteristics,
and a growing literature critically explicating its foundations.
This definition expands the scope and purpose of social work.
But the notion of the integrative sciences with a primary focus
on applied science and technology provides the frame for
understanding and solving problems in living that are central
to the historical and professional mission of social work. Social
work as an integrative science allows for the blending of values
and scientific rigor that are crucial for maintaining the identity
of social work, and for increasing its relevance and capacity for
solving critical problems in living.
A Final Issue: Which Preposition?
The framework articulated here proposes a SoSW. There are
other prepositions that could be used: science and social work,
science in social work, or even other phrases such as scientific
social work or social work science. There is little doubt that
social work should use scientific knowledge in its approach
to practice, that it should use scientific methods in its research,
and that scientific knowledge should infuse its education and
practice guidelines (Fong, 2012). An SoSW suggests that we
have a framework that can yield a discrete disciplinary scien-
tific approach that is meaningful both within and outside social
work, and further, that social work makes scope of knowledge
claims (for a science) as well as scope of practice claims (for a
profession) that define who we are and who we want to be.
Authors Note
This article was presented at the Islandwood Roundtable on Science in
Social Work, July 1718, 2013, Bainbridge Island, WA. It was invited
and accepted by the Editor.
Note
1. Disfunction is a proper equivalent of the word dysfunction.
Dys as a prefix is largely used in medical contexts. Disfunction
is meant to distinguish the term from more medically oriented con-
texts where dysfunction is commonly used.
Brekke
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to
the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.
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