Living in Silos: Social Work Research As a Bridge between Science and Social Change

Over the years, social work researchers have continuously wrestled with the crux of our identity as a scientific discipline. Oftentimes, categorization of our field is placed with and in relation to existing dichotomous silos of research. Micro-macro; basic-applied; research-practice; quantitative-qualitative; it is evident how these categories can feel insufficient for fully defining what social work science actually is and does. Social work research often bridges these categories or silos, in an effort to conduct research that is not only applied but enacts a theory of social change. It is this bridging, and perhaps the liminal space it creates, that offers social work science a unique situatedness in two ways. It challenges rigid disciplinary boundaries, epistemologically and methodologically. And because a theory of change is embedded in methodological considerations, it does not just apply its research, the research is encompassed within ongoing social and material change practices.

In this roundtable we ask how bridging the silos within academic research can be seen as a site of possibility, instead of a disciplinary problem. The roundtable features three presentations, and followed by a facilitated conversation with session attendees who will be invited to discuss the ways that they see themselves breaking down disciplinary silos within their own research. The speakers will specifically address: bridging between Western science and Indigenous epistemologies to implement culturally responsive and evidence-based practice with American Indian and Alaska Native Communities (CBPR); bridging between positivist and interpretivist frameworks when conducting socio-cultural neuroscience research on the developmental shaping of resilience (Mixed Methods); and bridging biological and socio-cultural frameworks in order to avoid slipping into essentialism in the development and enactment of theories of change (Multi-modal ethnography, PAR). Each presenter has been trained in a joint social work and social science doctoral program with alignments in social psychology, developmental psychology and sociocultural anthropology. Thus, speakers will offer a variety of disciplinary, positionality, and epistemological perspectives.

Our aim during this roundtable is to challenge participants to 1.) reflect on the ways that they bridge disciplinary silos in their own research, 2.) identify the ways in which their theories of change are strengthened due to this bridging and 3) evaluate how these bridging practices can be more intentionally developed so that our research has a greater impact on social change.