Social workers' strategies for treatment hypothesis testing

This study describes how social workers test their treatment hypotheses. The authors looked at the information search strategies and the intended use of this information (biased or unbiased). Information search strategies were defined as confirming or disconfirming the treatment hypotheses. These dependent variables were also examined in relation to confidence in the hypotheses, the number of alternative hypotheses, and whether the alternative hypotheses were complementary or contradictory to the original hypothesis. Analyses indicated marked variations in information search strategies and intended use of that information and a preference for confirmatory strategies and unbiased use of information. Among the conclusions suggested by the findings is that a critical approach to decision making can be enhanced by encouraging workers to give explicit rationales for their clinical decisions.