Afetlerde Psikososyal Destek Hizmetlerinin AFAD'da Çalışan Sosyal Çalışmacılar Tarafından Değerlendirilmesi

Abstract

ALAKARA ÖZCAN, Gülşah. Evaluation of Psychosocial Support Services in Disasters by Social Workers Working in AFAD, Graduate Thesis, Ankara, 2018. The aim of this study is to discover and uncover the current state of psychosocial support services in disasters and emergencies with holistic assessments of social workers working in AFAD. In this respect, research is based on the need to implement and develop psychosocial support services in disasters and emergencies with a holistic approach. In this framework, it is focused on self-evaluations of social workers working in AFAD, their institutional evaluations, and their evaluations of the field and psychosocial support services across the country. The experiences of social workers have been taken into account in the in-depth interviews with 13 social workers who work in different provincial directorates of AFAD. The analysis is conducted in order to understand the disasters and emergencies in which the social workers working in AFAD were assigned, their professional problems, the work they do in the field, the tools they use in psychosocial interventions, their opinions and experiences about psychosocial support plans and general problems of their psychosocial support services. As a result of the analysis, it was seen that social workers working in AFAD expressed more occupational satisfaction when they participated in disasters / emergencies rather than working at the desk. At the institutional level, it was asserted problems such as lack of job descriptions and ignored psychosocial support services. Especially experienced social workers have expressed that although psychosocial support plans are good in content, they are not functional in the field, and it appers that their such convictions are due to their experiences. In disasters and emergencies, among the general problems of psychosocial support services throughout the country have been pointed out as being uncoordinated and lack of a pool of competent staff. In this context, the research concludes with suggestions on what could be done in order to develop psychosocial support services in disasters and emergencies in the framework of institutional level, implementation-specific and academic studies. Key Words Disaster, emergency, psychosocial support in disasters, social work in disasters,