Abstract

The work of caring for children and youth in residential care is a type of “mental demand,” in Kegan’s phrase, and in this study we used Kegan’s constructive developmental theory to interpret the mental demands on front-line child and youth care practitioners. The research questions were (a) how do different meaning-making systems influence how practitioners cope with and experience the demands of the job, and (b) what do child and youth care practitioners, with different meaning-making systems, identify as the primary challenges and the most satisfying experiences, and how do they experience and cope with these challenges? From the initial pool of 99, eighteen participants were selected for in-depth, qualitative interviews to assess the ways in which they make meaning and explore their experiences in residential care. There was internal coherence among the self-authoring and socialized epistemological orders and across organizations. This way of understanding the work reinterprets practice problems, including boundaries and limit testing, turnover and burnout, and how to do supervision.

摘要

寄宿照料中的儿童和青少年照料工作，用凯根的话说是一种“心理需求”，在本研究中，我们用凯根的建设性发展理论来解读一线儿童和青少年照料从业人员的心理需求。研究问题是 (a) 不同的意义构建系统如何影响从业者应对和体验工作需求的方式，以及 (b) 具有不同意义构建系统的儿童和青年护理从业者认为什么是主要的挑战和最满意的经历，他们是如何经历和应对这些挑战的？从最初的 99 名参与者中，选出了 18 名参与者进行深入、定性的访谈，以评估他们在住宿护理中创造意义和探索体验的方式。自我创作的和社会化的认识论秩序之间以及跨组织之间存在内部一致性。这种理解工作的方式重新诠释了实践问题，包括边界和极限测试，离职和倦怠，以及如何进行监督。