Human Behavior
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SSW HB 720: Human Behavior in the Social Environment
This course constitutes the foundation course in the human behavior department and is the underpinning of all courses in the HBSE sequence. HB 720 is designed to help you chart a knowledgeable course through the complexity of human experience. We explore a select set of theories that help us understand how individuals and communities develop and interact. Because empathic and skillful interventions with individuals, groups, and communities require understanding ourselves as well as others, the course provides an opportunity for increased self-awareness. At the beginning of the course, we focus on the key theories that help us understand the dimensions and expression of human behavior in the social environment. This discussion is followed by an examination of how dimensions of culture and cultural contexts can shape individual values, beliefs, worldviews, and identities, all of which play a role in the helping process. Through discussion and analysis, we explore areas of universality and difference in the context of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, spiritual beliefs, and socioeconomic class, as well as the realities and influence of multiple forms of oppression. Finally, we examine human development throughout the lifespan, considering the developmental scientific knowledge base regarding opportunities and vulnerabilities present during the different stages of the lifecycle, and the biopsychosocial and cultural factors that can influence individual development. The ability to analyze human behavior in the social environment is essential for all methods of social work practice, whether the primary focus is clinical or macro. The goal of the course is to enable students to develop a culturally competent framework for analyzing human behavior in order to create empathic, empowering relationships with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities. Social work theory and practice has a unique perspective that articulates the interconnection between an individual and his or her environment. The framework draws from other disciplines, including anthropology, economics, psychology, biology, and sociology. The course builds on your undergraduate knowledge of basic human behavior theories, adding theoretical breadth, critical contextualization, and professional application. -
SSW HB 723: Adult Psychopathology
The goal of this course is to provide students with a framework for understanding human behavior when challenges to healthy adult functioning overwhelm coping mechanisms and resources. A biopsychosocial model of psychopathology is emphasized as we study some of the disorders classified in the DSM-IV, including anxiety disorders, mood disorders, psychotic disorders, PTSD, dissociative disorders, personality disorders, eating disorders, and substance abuse/addictions. Complex factors in the etiology of various disorders are considered, including genetic, neurochemical, biological, developmental, familial, sociocultural, and political variables that affect the occurrence, presentation, course, and treatment of a problem. While learning the perspective and language of the phenomenological approach outlined in the DSM-IV, we also highlight weaknesses and blind spots in the traditional approach to diagnoses. In particular, we explore the impact of oppression and bias on the naming and treatment of mental disorders, including the influences of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, disability, religion, and ethnicity on the diagnostic process. Students learn to consider the DSM-IV classification system as a social construction that reveals as much about the society and its views of human behavior as it does about the clients with whom social workers have contact. While this course is not designed to focus on treatment, students have the opportunity to consider how diagnoses inform treatment and review current research on both biological and psychosocial treatments for different disorders. Finally, we seek to enhance empathic understanding of our clients? experiences and the experiences of their families and loved ones, remembering that people are not their diagnoses, that what is labeled individual ?pathology? may be an adaptive response to oppressive external circumstances, and that people who experience a breakdown in functioning demonstrate not only difficulties but also compelling strengths. This course employs lecture, large and small group discussion, case presentations, and videotapes. Clinical vignettes from instructors and class are used to illustrate mental disorders and theoretical perspectives, and make material relevant to clinical practice, particularly with urban populations -
SSW HB 727: Child Psychopathology
Grad Prereq: SSW HB 720 or permission of department chair. *This course uses a developmental psychopathological model to explore complex psychological disturbances in children, adolescents, and families with a focus on the urban family experience. It addresses multiple research and theoretical perspectives that promote a way of understanding ?normal? and ?pathological? child and adolescent behaviors that change over time in the context of their genetic make-up, biological processes, interpersonal relationships, culture, and available community resources and support. In this course, developmental, systemic, psychodynamic, neurobiological and behavioral theoretical perspectives inform students? understanding of children and adolescents? adaptive and maladaptive patterns of behavior, which evolve over time in the context of their complex developmental histories and socio-cultural relational experiences. The course promotes the importance of assessing in children and families both the historical and present risks for disturbed behavioral development and the historical and present protective factors that promote healthy and resilient behavioral development. Implied throughout the course curriculum is the perspective that a deep understanding of children?s adaptations to stress and trauma is central in the social worker?s role of making informed and accurate assessments and diagnostic evaluations of children, adolescents, and families. Discussion of clinical case material and relevant research assists students in learning to assess children and adolescents? current, unique developmental needs and strengths with a goal of empowering them to find pathways of behavior that better meet these developmental needs and give freedom to the deepening of these strengths. 3 cr. -
SSW HB 732: Perspectives on the Family and Diversity
Over time the meaning of family has changed, as have the ways in which families are understood theoretically and in clinical practice. The aim of this course is to examine relevant issues of contemporary families from theoretical, cultural, and clinical perspectives. Emphasis is placed on students? ability to integrate theory with their practice. The course begins by examining families from a historical and sociological perspective. We then focus on the life cycle of the family and various models of family therapy. The course examines relevant issues in families such as culture, foster families, adoptive families, remarried families, gay, lesbian and transgender families, families with disabilities, and kinship care. -
SSW HB 741: Family Violence in Society
This course introduces students to the dynamics of family violence and its multiple effects on children, adults, and communities. It draws from current evidence from social work, the social sciences, and neurobiology to frame our theoretical understanding of family violence. We also review a number of prevention and intervention programs for a variety of populations. Special attention is given to the impact of violence upon vulnerable populations, including women, children, and elders. The course also discusses current knowledge regarding the perpetration of family violence, with a specific focus on intimate partner violence, child physical abuse, and child sexual abuse. The course equips students to work competently and in an evidence-informed manner in family violence research, advocacy, practice ,and policy. Specifically, students deepen their understanding of the following: theoretical frameworks for understanding the etiology and dynamics of multiple forms of family violence in society, the historical and contemporary influences in current social policy related to family violence, and prevention and intervention approaches for individuals and communities affected by family violence. -
SSW HB 744: Spirituality and Social Work Practice
The goal of this course is to acquaint the student with current theories regarding religion and spirituality and their role in clinical work. Particular attention is given to the function of spirituality and religion in bridging internal and external adaptations throughout the life cycle. Utilizing psychodynamic and narrative frameworks, this course addresses ways of assessing and working with an individual?s spiritual and existential belief systems and attending to the ways in which spiritual beliefs and practices provide a window into a client?s inner world. In addition, the course addresses issues of transference and countertransference as they arise in the exploration of religious and spiritual material in psychotherapy. The course draws heavily on case material, film, and fiction. -
SSW HB 746: Resilience Across the Lifespan
Humans have an amazing capacity to adapt well to adversity?a phenomenon known as resilience. This course uses a resilience framework to explore development across the lifespan, with implications for social work practice. The approach presumes that resilience results from dynamic interactions between individuals and their environments, and that every person has the potential to overcome significant challenge at any point in the life course. The construct of resilience has become well-used in social science fields, perhaps as a reaction to deficit models of development, or as part of a renewed focus on human strengths. As a result, greater attention is paid to those who do well ?despite the odds,? and on the environmental contexts that support these adaptations. The course examines conceptual, empirical, and applied work on resilience, including new and sometimes controversial applications of resilience theory to social work practice with individuals, families, and communities. -
SSW HB 747: Adverse Childhood Experiences
By virtue of their direct practice roles in a range of agencies that offer health and human services to children, youth, and families, social workers are in an ideal position to address adverse childhood events and their developmental sequelae. This course uses an ecological perspective, risk/resilience framework, and developmental perspective to examine conceptual, empirical, and applied work on adverse childhood events such as physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect. We will examine, from a variety of theoretical frameworks, the factors, indicators, and dynamics associated with adverse childhood events. Prevention, practice, policy and research issues will be critically assessed. Particular attention will be given to understanding developmental sequelae of adverse childhood events, including emotional/behavioral problems and addictive behaviors. -
SSW HB 749: Social Perspectives on Health and Illness
This course is designed to orient students toward major contemporary health issues and to foster an understanding of the way that social, environmental, and cultural contexts can contribute to either health or illness. The course is premised on the notion that understanding how context influences these outcomes is of direct importance to social work practice in a variety of domains. The course is organized into three modules. The first introduces students to important historical, theoretical, and current perspectives on health and illness and provides the groundwork for the rest of the course. The second module focuses on health and illness using the social ecology of health model. The last module focuses on emergent issues in health and illness, integrating the knowledge from the first two modules in order to demonstrate to students the multitude of ways in which social contexts can jointly promote health-related outcomes. -
SSW HB 750: Organizational Behavior and Culture
This course familiarizes the student with basic concepts related to organizational behavior and culture in human service organizations. The primary focus is on how human service organizations function, with a particular focus on the influence of internal and external factors, and methods for achieving change within these settings. -
SSW HB 751: Human Neuropsychology
Students develop foundational knowledge in the structure and function of the nervous system with special emphasis on processes underlying common neuropsychological disorders. The course is designed to make basic neuroscience accessible and interesting for students with a minimum of basic science background.We cover basic neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, neurochemistry and nervous system development in the context of neuropsychological disorders to provide a clinical context for material that might otherwise seem overwhelming. -
SSW HB 752: Exploring Ethnicity, Race, and Culture through Narratives: Clinical and Human Behavior Perspectives
A major purpose of this course is to deepen students' knowledge of the role of culture in lifespan development and human behavior. Building on knowledge and skills from the foundation courses Human Behavior, HB 720 and Clinical Practice, CP 759, that apply ecological and systems frameworks to themes of identity formation, risks and resiliency, loss and death. In addition, through narrative stories themes such as dual cultural identity, oppression and diaspora are explored, and students will leave the class able to (1) identify various expressions of cultural identity, (2) articulate the strengths of cultural affiliation, (3) distinguish between behaviors that represent psychopathology and behaviors that are expressions of cultural values and/or traditions, and (4) describe the distinct experiences of individuals living in the context of diaspora; (5) determine the role of systemic oppression on individuals whose experiences are not part of dominant cultural perspectives in the United States, and (6) recognize the value of cross-cultural theoretical and research literature that describes how to approach work with groups discussed in the narratives presented in the course.
