Social Work social media app

Tarsem Singh Cooner, Associate Director at the University's Centre of Excellence in Interdisciplinary Mental Health, has launched a new app designed to help students to learn about the role of social media in life-like ethical social work dilemmas.

The app offers you an innovative and practical way to explore some of the ethical issues of using social media in social work. In the app users meet a 'Team Manager' who presents some ethical dilemmas around social media use. Users then help him make the right decisions to ensure his team’s practices are consistent with social work ethics and values. They are also encouraged to reflect on decisions and consider the potential impact these may have on day-to-day social work practises in relation to social media use.

The app uses a games based approach to stimulate discussion and debate, and present scenarios via channels that many students use in their personal lives. The app broadly covers the following themes:

• Is social media skills development important for social workers?
• What are the ethical implications of exploring open social media profiles?
• Should social workers be mindful of their online image?
• Does social media present new personal/professional boundary issues?
• How can social workers effectively engage in continuing professional development when using social media?
• Can skills, knowledge and confidence in social media use lead to greater service user, community, inter-professional engagement?

The app is available now from iTunes and Google Play for further details visit https://sites.google.com/site/socialworksocialmedia/.