HomeAbstract of 10th hsconfIncreasing Parents’ Desire for Positive Growth and Change: Novel and Traditional Approaches to the Use of Motivational Interviewing with Child Welfare Involved Families

Increasing Parents’ Desire for Positive Growth and Change: Novel and Traditional Approaches to the Use of Motivational Interviewing with Child Welfare Involved Families

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on New Findings in Humanities and Social Sciences, 2024

Year: 2024

DOI:

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Increasing Parents’ Desire for Positive Growth and Change: Novel and Traditional Approaches to the Use of Motivational Interviewing with Child Welfare Involved Families

Dr. Amy Vargo

 

 

ABSTRACT:

Child welfare systems have increasingly mandated the use of evidence-based behavioral health interventions with the children and families they serve in an effort to move from crisis to prevention driven care.  Motivational Interviewing (MI) is an evidence-based counseling approach designed to facilitate behavior change and enhance physiological, psychological, and lifestyle outcomes. The primary goal of MI is to identify and address ambivalence towards change while increasing motivation to change. By encouraging clients to reflect on their personal goals and how their current behaviors may hinder their achievement, MI assists in exploring reasons for change and reinforcing the possibility of behavior change. Findings from the United States will be shared specific to the implementation of two approaches to MI with child welfare involved families: a traditional clinical application targeting points of resistance within an individual’s behavior change process, and a more broadly trained version of MI designed to cause a philosophical shift among child welfare professionals and their approach to client engagement. Funded through the Administration for Children and Families, data was collected via statewide survey, stakeholder interviews, and observations. Lessons learned will be shared specific to capacity and resources necessary to support each of the two MI approaches, challenges and areas of need, advantages and disadvantages to using MI with child welfare involved families, and opportunities for enhancement. The utility of an implementation science framework aimed at reducing the research to practice gap that often occurs when transferring evidence-based interventions to realistic community and treatment settings will also be explored.

keywords: mental health, child welfare, motivation, change, families