Gender Aspects of Social Work

The thesis, "Gender aspects of social work" deals with the issue of incidence of gender stereotypes and prejudices among social workers both gender in České Budějovice. The goal of this work is to find out if gender stereotypes and prejudices could be found in their mind and in practical approach to clients. Moreover, we would like to identify what create conditions for them and how the individuals try to deal with them. The theoretical part is divided into four chapters which focus on terms gender, gender issues generally as well as in connection with social work and above all on gender stereotypes and the incidence in the area of social work. The basic terms are discussed as gender, gender identity, gender role, gender contract and gender socialization. I am concerned with differences between gender, division of male and female role and created gender stereotypes. In addition, I deal with the theme of gender studies and discrimination in connection with gender marginally. Primarily, the theoretical part is focused on gender stereotypes and prejudices in social work and personality of social workers. The practical part is a description of the qualitative research, where attitudes of representative social workers are investigated in case of gender stereotypes and prejudices. With regard to the objective and qualitative strategy of this theses, two research questions were defined: 1) Is there any awareness in social workers about possible gender stereotypes and prejudices in social work?, 2) Are gender stereotypes and prejudices present in behavior, opinions and attitudes of social workers or as the case may be how they are manifested in approach to clients? Semi-structured interviews with 5 women and 1 man were conducted for the purpose of this study. They were selected by objective sampling intentionally. All of them work in organizations of social work in České Budějovice. The realization of the study took place in May 2014 in České Budějovice. The results were divided into three parts on the basis of semi-structured interviews and then were analyzed by the method of clustering. In the first part of interview, I am concerned with the basic information about social workers in connection with performance of social work. Then I focus on their own gender socialization and their idea what is the optimal distribution of gender role in family. Second part of interview is focused on consciousness of social workers about gender in social work. I took an interest in incidence of stereotyped behavior and creation of attitudes to clients. Moreover, the possibility of preference clients on the grounds of affiliation with gender was explored. The final part of interview, I focus briefly on reflexion of social workers and instruments which are used for reflexion of gender stereotypes and prejudices. The results were analyzed in a qualitative way and transformed to uncluttered charts. Results showed gender stereotypes and biases occur among social workers of male and female gender and their primary attitude to male or female clients is influenced by them. The incidence is mainly affected by transferring patterns of men and women role from their families. Nevertheless, men and female social workers are aware of their incidence and they try to eliminate and reflect them during their work. Because of these mechanisms, the attitude of social workers to male and female clients is getting better. In future, the thesis may serve as a source of information for social workers as well as general public who take an interest in this area