Week 2 Summary: PIE, Strengths, and Empowerment

1. Week 2 Summary
Concepts
and Themes
Readings:
•PIE: A New Language for Social Work
•The Strengths Perspective in Social Work
Practice: Extensions and Cautions
•Working with Women of Color: An
Empowerment Perspective

2. PIE: New Language for Social
Work
 Social workers working in direct service, specifically clinical social workers,
are trained to use the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) for diagnosis and treatment.
Social workers found that when identifying and recording information from
clients, they were really only describing the medical issue rather than the
relationship between what the client was presenting and what/how factors
outside of their individual health states (such as the environment) might be
impacting their presentation.
 PIE (Person-In-Environment) is different from the Diagnostic Statistical
Manual used by those in the field of Psychology and Psychiatry. It includes 4
factors; “social role problems, environmental problems, mental disorders, and
physical disorders” (Karls & Wandrei, 1992, pp. 82-84) so as to reflect
biopsychosocial factors that impact human behavior in micro and macro
contexts
 The article PIE: A New Language for Social Work explains the thinking
behind early iterations of the PIE framework; explaining the components of
the framework, as well as offering some rationalization for its development
including:
◦ “Need for language to address the role the environment plays in shaping
human behavior (including strengths and areas for growth)
◦ Need of social work practitioners to develop common language
◦ Relevance to continued professionalization of social work and social work
research” (Karls & Wandrei, 1992, pp. 82-84)

3. PIE: A New Language for
Social Work
 Article references DSM III and DSM IIIR, currently
DSM V is used in the field
 Related to history of social work, comes from
continued transition in social work to
professionalization
 It is not important that you are familiar with the
intricate details explained in this submission, but
instead that you understand how and why this
framework was developed and its relationship to
the readings on Strengths and Empowerment
Perspectives.
 ***This article will also serve as an example of the
thinking that goes into development of
framework/way in which research is developed and
implemented.

4. The Strengths Perspective in Social Work:
Extensions and Cautions
Key Points from Reading
 Developed in response to myriad ways U.S. culture
addresses “problems in living; disorder, abnormality,
deficits…..” (Saleebey, 1996, pp. 302-303)
 Relationship to essential objective #2 – concept of
pathology; disorder, abnormality, and deficits and the
manner in which social institutions promote or deter
diverse individuals
 Pay special attention to Table 1 at the top of page 298
(Compare – Why is a strengths based approach so
challenging in a helping profession? Why would it be
easier or make more sense to implement a pathology
approach?)
 Key Terms: Empowerment, resilience
 Importance of the narrative, story construction
 Criticism of Strengths Perspective – “Positive thinking in
disguise, reframing misery, pollyannaism, ignoring
reality” (Saleebey, 1996, pp. 302-303)

5. Working with Women of Color:
An Empowerment Perspective
Key Points from Reading
 Definition of empowerment – is a “process of increasing personal, interpersonal or political power so
that individuals can take action to improve their life situations… roots in community organization
methods, adult education techniques, feminist theory, and political psychology” (Gutierrez, 1990, p.
149)
 Gutierrez article addresses empowerment from the perspective that through the development or
elevation of personal power, individuals will see a relationship to a larger group power or effort in
society; I am not the only one – there are others with challenges/concerns similar to me and I can work
with those others to increase our power and effect change – important elements of this thinking involve
how a person’s increased personal power can be used to effect the behavior of others, distribution of
resources, and the idea that it should be done from an ecological perspective (taking into consideration
the interaction of biopsychosocial factors of human behavior and micro/macro contexts) as opposed to
an individual, pathological response (Gutierrez, 1990)
 4 Associated Psychological Changes critical to development of power as described in article(Gutierrez,
1990, p. 150):
◦ Increasing self-efficacy: the ability to “produce and to regulate events in one’s life” (Bandura, 1982,
p. 122 as cited in Gutierrez, 1990, p. 150) – develop personal understanding and feeling of control
over one’s life
◦ Developing group consciousness
◦ Reducing self blame – through development of group consciousness and self-efficacy, individuals
recognize that they do not have deficits so much as there are institutional structures deterring them
from increasing their power and changing their situation
◦ Assuming personal responsibility
 Techniques and their relationship to Strengths Perspective (Gutierrez, 1990, p. 151-152):
◦ Accepting client’s definition
◦ Identifying and building upon existing client strengths
◦ Engaging in power analysis of situation
◦ Teaching specific skills
◦ Mobilizing resources and advocating for clients

6. References
 Gutierrez, L (1990) Working with Women of Color: An Empowerment
Perspective. Social Work, 35 (2) 149-153.
 Karls, J. E. (1992). PIE: A New Language for Social Work. Social
Work, 37(1), 80-85.
 Saleebey, D. (1996). The Strengths Perspective in Social Work:
Extensions and Cautions. Social Work, 41(3), 296-305.
◦ Please note, reference entries in APA should have a hanging indent (tab one
space to the right for lines after first). In this presentation format, the lines
have been reformatted.

7. Example: Slideshare
 Go to slideshare.net for more
information about this web-based
presentation format