Methods
In the two evaluations reported here there were a total of 215 participants
who were Masters level social work students from two graduating classes
in a single school of social work in the Northeastern U.S. These were single
group, pretest –posttest evaluations with the first administration done
in classes near the beginning of the course of study and the second administration
occurring approximately one month prior to graduation. The outcome measure
in these evaluations was the Social Work Self-Efficacy Scale (SWSE), which
was based upon Social Cognitive Theory. The SWSE is a 52-item scale developed
in line with Bandura’s scale development guidelines, using items adapted
from the Practice Skills Inventory. The SWSE measures students’ confidence
in their ability to perform a range of practice-related activities. The
second administration also contained a retrospective pretest for the SWSE
(‘then’ test) to assess the presence of response shift bias.
Results
Pretest to posttest and then test to posttest changes were statistically
significant for the overall SWSE scale and all subscales in both evaluations
(alpha = .00178, Bonferroni adjustment). Given that in 9 of 10 instances
the then test mean was significantly less than the pretest mean, response
shift bias appears to have been a factor.
Implications for Practice
The results of these evaluations demonstrate that students’ confidence
in their practice skills improved significantly, and prior research suggests
that self-efficacy correlates moderately with job performance. Outcomes
assessment in social work education and the development and psychometric
properties of this scale will be described in depth.