The National Institutes of Health has identified polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) as a major public health problem for women in the United States. PCOS is a set of symptoms due to elevated androgens (male hormones) in females. PCOS is caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors and has no cure. It is the most common endocrine disorder among ... Read More »

The most recent issue of the journal Children & Schools, co-published by NASW and Oxford University Press, is a themed issue on assessment tools for school social workers. Evidence-based assessment, which requires the use of reliable and valid measurement tools, is an essential component of many services that school social workers provide to promote the social, emotional, and behavioral health ... Read More »

A special issue of the journal Social Work, published by NASW and Oxford University Press, seeks to deepen the social work profession’s conceptualization of self-care and promote effective implementation of self-care in professional practice. The issue’s coeditors and contributors advocate for self-care as an essential element of ethical professional practice. One article in the issue was authored by social workers ... Read More »

Social workers are uniquely situated to lead community-based efforts to reduce gun violence, which has been identified as a prevalent and pressing public health concern. The current literature, however, has not addressed the frameworks guiding community-based interventions for gun violence. The most recent issue of the journal Health & Social Work, co-published by NASW Press and Oxford University Press, is ... Read More »

School-based social work and sex education are both intended to provide education and services designed to support the healthy emotional and physical development of youths. However, school social work and sex education have been developed and implemented largely in parallel to one another, with little attention paid to the similarities of their objectives or potential for interdisciplinary partnership. In a ... Read More »

As the social work field increasingly recognizes economic abuse within intimate partner relationships, the field has developed financial empowerment programs to empower survivors for their financial future. Although research has demonstrated the effectiveness of financial literacy programs, there are barriers to their implementation in the field. Studies have explored, from the perspective of advocates, best practices in incorporating financial literacy ... Read More »

A number of protective factors associated with being American Indian exist; however, research shows that American Indians tend to experience higher rates of depressive symptoms than individuals of other racial or ethnic groups. Although prior research has examined sociocultural predictors of American Indian depression, less is known about the influence of familial functioning. This is particularly true for American Indian ... Read More »

The contextual factors and individual responses to the labeling of military-connected adolescents as “being in a military family” is an understudied yet important phenomenon. Minimal research construes the experience of being in a military family as a label applied to military-connected populations by people in society. However, social environmental factors associated with school setting among military-connected adolescents being in a ... Read More »

In case you missed it, here are some of the features in the latest issue of Social Work Advocates. Top stories include: Undoing Racism: How the Social Work Profession is Working Toward Healing and Equality Institutional racism persists in the United States, affecting many people in communities of color. While nobody has all of the answers, the social work profession has ... Read More »

For more than two decades varied models of school-linked services and school–family–community partnerships have been advanced with the goal of improving the educational, developmental, mental health, health, and social outcomes for children and families. In a recent issue of the journal Children & Schools, published by NASW Press and Oxford University Press, researchers revealed their findings from a study on ... Read More »