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Research
Below you will find publications, research briefs, and short infographics for my research. Click on the picture to expand and access the link.
*Please note that some of the infographics correspond with published articles which should be used if the information presented here is cited.
“The trauma of system failure:” The Interactional Process affecting MSW intern trauma exposure response
Social workers are frequently exposed to the suffering of clients and communities they partner with while navigating multiple institutional factors exacerbating their and their clients’ trauma. While significant research has identified high levels of trauma exposure response and burnout among master’s level social workers, limited work explicitly examines what influences the impact of trauma exposure response among MSW interns. As such, a Grounded Theory design was used to understand the process through which MSW interns and supervisors identify and respond to the manifestation of interns’ trauma exposure in placement. Data were collected via in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 15 MSW interns and 11 supervisors from three MSW programs. Findings inform the Interactional Process of the Three S’s, which highlights the process through which the Self, Supervisor, and System either exacerbate or mitigate interns’ trauma exposure response. Although interns leveraged coping skills, most interns described a “hopelessness” as they internalized the inability to change the circumstances that continued to traumatize their clients. A few interns could make meaning out of their roles, primarily influenced by the support from their supervisors. Interviews with supervisors outline how personal experiences and coping methods, their own experience with their supervisors, and the university collectively impact how they support interns exposed to client trauma. The Interactional Process underscores the need to address harmful policies and practices throughout social work systems. Implications describe points of intervention for universities and placement sites to implement to protect MSW interns and their supervisors.
Liberatory Participatory Action Research
There has been a visible increase in the use of Participatory Action Research (PAR) among qualitative researchers. PAR was developed out of a need to upend hierarchical power structures by centering community knowledge and inciting change. By centering community participation and a commitment to political action, liberatory PAR can be used as a tool to challenge oppressive systems and enact political transformation. Despite such admirable ambitions, these promises of action and change are often unrealized in qualitative research. We ground this entry in critical race theory for education, Black feminism, and community organizing to explore the tensions and difficulties inherent in conducting PAR research in university settings. Recognizing the hegemonic approach to mainstream research traditions, we critically examine university researchers' efforts to use PAR to interrupt oppressive systems. To that end, we present three critical considerations for a liberatory PAR praxis: (1) the co-creation of community, (2) liberatory spaces within projects to dream of a new future, and (3) the uptake of systemic action towards liberation.
Addressing Anti-Black Racism in Social Work Education: A Policy Brief to Ensure Black Students Thrive in Social Work
Black students’ experiences of racism and microaggressions in college are widespread and often met by a lack of university response. Social work programs are not immune, as experiences of racism within social work programs lead to poor mental health and academic outcomes for Black students. Of concern, increasing legislation across the United States has been enacted to restrict and weaken university diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. This legislation abrogates means to address racialized inequities within higher education and, therefore, social work education, leaving Black students vulnerable to mistreatment. In the current landscape of anti-Black violence and the disavowal of legislation meant to benefit the Black community, we recommend policies to reduce the hate perpetuated by current legislation and to transform social work programs from places of harm to places of safety and belonging for Black students.
‘We are not ok’: a photovoice study on educational violence and resistance by and for Black undergraduate students at predominantly white institutions
Experiences of individual and institutional racism within education hinders the ability of Black students to study safely, negatively impacting their mental health and academic outcomes. However, universities continuously fail to respond, ultimately silencing Black students. Despite persistent educational violence, Black students continue to thrive through radical resistance. To highlight both experiences of oppression and resistance, the current study utilized photovoice to understand the intersectional experience of 5 Black women undergraduate students at predominantly white institutions. Implications inform actionable strategies to ensure Black students are in a space where they can thrive.
“The Things We Carry”: Interventions against the cumulative effects of racism in K-12 education
Anti-Black racism in K-12 education settings has long-term impacts on Black students, including negative academic and mental health outcomes. Limited interventions following experiences of racism shape Black students’ expectations of K-12 education, accumulating over time into institutional distrust and these mental health outcomes. As such, it is necessary to understand how Black students experience racism within K-12 settings to better inform interventions that can be implemented at the school level. To that end, this study employed the participatory action research (PAR) method of photovoice to understand the impacts of racism in educational settings among 5 Black women undergraduate students. Results highlight the cumulative effects of racism on identity development and early coping. Implications inform future interventions to address the cumulative effects of anti-Black racism in K-12 education
“Unfortunately what’s right isn’t always what’s best”: Exploring teacher and school staff experiences with mandated reporting
Mandated reporting is the current system in place for school personnel to support youth whom they suspect have experienced maltreatment. However, limited research details the experiences of mandated reporters. Thus, the current study utilizes reflexive thematic analysis to explore how school personnel identify and respond to suspected abuse. Analysis of interviews with 14 school personnel who made reports resulted in three themes: (1) the subjectivity of the decision to report; (2) the absence of youth voices; and (3) experiences navigating inadequate systems of support. Findings illuminate the tensions reporters hold and reinforce calls to implement supports for youth and families.
“At What Point Do You Ask a Suicidal Teen to Do Their Math Homework?”: How Los Angeles Teachers Are Navigating the Effects of Violence-Related Trauma in the Classroom
Racism, violence exposure, trauma, and education are inextricably linked, impacting adolescents’ current and future well-being. Although trauma-informed care models are being adopted in schools, research is unclear about what individual and institutional factors influence teachers’ responses to students exposed to violence-related trauma. Findings from this qualitative convergent mixed-methods study highlight how teachers’ personal attributes, identity match, and institutional limitations collectively influence teachers’ ability to support their students and their own well-being.
For the institution or for the community?: toward an anti-oppressive research praxis in conducting participatory action research
Participatory action research has the goal of democratizing knowledge to inform individual and collective action. Photovoice, an arts-based method within the broader PAR landscape, provides a lens for exploring community strengths and needs with the purpose of social change. Research demonstrates photovoice’s utility in inciting social change with and for communities, yet concerns arise over the lack of participant voices in the analysis, writing, and dissemination of the projects leaving us to question, “Is our research for the institution or for the community?” This conceptual article extends PAR scholarship about conducting an anti-oppressive research praxis by drawing on the lived experiences of two uni-researchers and two co-researchers and their use of praxis across two separate photovoice research projects. We describe three key principles in conducting an anti-oppressive research praxis and conclude with implications for practice and research.
A New World Cannot be Built Alone: An Abolitionist Perspective for Collective Action in Social Work
States across the U.S. are increasingly passing anti-CRT and anti-trans policies, most of which have begun to pervade institutions of higher education, igniting a concerning trend that is harming our communities, clients, students, and each other. While social work has been quick to name the harms of the systems with which we engage, it fails to address the mechanisms underlying those systems. To better aid schools of social work to move toward meaningful action, this conceptual article presents an abolitionist framework for collective action that highlights how social work schools and educators can resist performative responses to legislative terror. This framework calls for social work to take on the role of fugitive as we critically examine, disrupt, and disinvest from harmful power structures in social work. By adopting an abolitionist approach to collective action, schools of social work can better prepare faculty and students to engage in collective action for a more just society.
Freedom Dreaming of a New UF
The PDF provides infographics by Mary Nguyen of key themes that were identified by co-researchers during their photovoice project entitled "BLooming Through the Darkness." This project shed light on the experiences of 7 Black undergraduate students at UF. They highlighted how they cultivate joy, care for their communities, and freedom dream, all in the face of oppression at a PWI.
Academic Achievement after Violence Exposure: The Indirect Effects of School Attachment and Motivation to Succeed
SDisparities in educational outcomes for students living in communities burdened with high rates of violence are striking as they are at an increased risk for misbehavior, low GPA, poor school attendance, and decreased standardized test scores. However, limited research identifies the role that schools play in exacerbating exposure to violence to inform changes that aid in mitigating violence exposure. As such, this study utilizes the Pathways to Desistance Study to explore the mediating roles of school attachment and motivation to succeed on students’ academic outcomes after exposure to community violence. Using a serial mediation model, findings indicate that school attachment and motivation to succeed mediate the relationship between exposure to violence and grades. Implications for adapting school programs and policies as well as providing teacher training to increase school attachment and motivation are discussed.
The Interactional Process of The Self, The Supervisor, and the System.
The article coming soon! Infographic by the wonderful Mary Nguyen!
“What I Would Do to Take Away Your Pain”: A Photovoice Project Conducted by Mothers of Children With Medical Complexity
Research identifies that families of children with medical complexities in the United States have diverse and complex needs. Despite research emphasizing that families demonstrate higher needs that are not being met, limited research focuses solely on mothers of children with medical complexities. Specifically, how mothers understand and identify themselves, understand and define their role in coordinating care, and how they view their own mental and physical health. As such, this study provides a better understanding of how mothers in San Diego, CA, navigate the day-to-day psychological, social, and physical realities of having a child with medical complexities. Through the use of the participatory action research method photovoice, mothers conducted a critical analysis of their daily lives. Findings identify mothers’ main concerns about the conditions of their lives as well as the strengths they employ to care for themselves and their children successfully. Implications provide recommendations for hospitals working with mothers of children with medical complexities.
Black Lives Matter all the Time: A Photovoice Project with Undergraduate Black Women at Predominantly White Institutions
Infographics for the photovoice exhibit. Created by Mary Nguyen.
The Individual and InstitutionalPathway of Trauma (Re)Production in Schools
Infographics that explain the conceptual framework for the individual and institutional factors that (re)produce trauma in schools. Created by Mary Nguyen
The Role of Trauma-Informed Training in Helping Los Angeles Teachers Manage the Effects of Student Exposure to Violence and Trauma
Exposure to trauma, such as community violence, has far-reaching effects on childrens’ learning and behavior. While schools are a critical place to provide positive and safe spaces for students, teachers have self-reported a lack of knowledge on how to work effectively with traumatized students. In response to this, there has been an increase in teacher training on trauma-related topics. However, it is unclear how training impacts teachers’ trauma knowledge and difficulty responding to traumatized students in the classroom. As such, this exploratory study used a survey (N = 94) with Los Angeles teachers to assess whether training on violence and trauma is related to trauma knowledge and reported difficulty responding to traumatized students. Regression analyses indicate that total training increased teachers’ trauma knowledge, which was found to mediate teachers’ difficulty responding to traumatized students. Findings from this study support the need for a focus on trauma-informed training within the education context.
The (Re)production of Violence and Trauma in High Schools: How Institutional Policies and Practices Influence Teacher and Staff Decision Making
Research shows that violence exposure, trauma, and education are inextricably linked, cyclically influencing one another and impacting adolescents’ current and future well-being. These experiences are caused and often exacerbated by racism embedded within institutions. This complex relationship between trauma and exposure to violence negatively impacts adolescents’ behavioral and academic functioning within schools. Experiences of trauma and post-traumatic stress impact adolescents throughout their lives, trickling down into schools perpetuating the inequities that uphold marginalization. While the impact of violence exposure and trauma on individual youth has been clearly delineated, research has failed to highlight their institutional causes. Understood as an individual problem, the concept of trauma creates and maintains a deficit framework that blames students and their communities for experiencing systemic causes of harm. Through this pathological approach to addressing violence-related trauma, harmful policies and practices within schools are masked. Research that is unclear on the complex ways institutions reproduce or even create harm renders the systemic causes of violence-related trauma invisible. To challenge the individual deficit approach to trauma-informed care in schools, a constructivist grounded theory multiple case study design was used to explore how teachers and school staff perceive, are impacted by, and respond to the manifestation of trauma derived from community violence exposure in three High Schools in Los Angeles County, California. Findings draw from critical race theory and healing justice to inform a conceptual framework that describes how individual responses to trauma can be situated within institutional power dynamics. The framework from this study details the nexus between teacher education programs, district policies, resources, staff biases, and collective well-being through four main themes: (1) these teachers and school staff determine what constituted trauma for a student, even with minimal information; (2) individual experiences embedded within institutional factors encourage paternalism as the main response to trauma in schools; (3) this response leads to the demoralization of those caring for students; and (4) combined, each of these factors holds a cumulative impact on current and future students. I conclude by discussing the need to identify institutional causes of trauma to understand better and meaningfully address the (re)production of violence-related trauma in schools.
School discipline as a consequence of violent victimization: Understanding the mediating roles of head injury and fighting.
Pathways from violence to head injury and poor long-term outcomes have been found among numerous populations, however, have not yet been widely examined with youth exposed to violence. Traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) are linked to a range of consequences salient to adolescent development and well-being, such as impulsivity, academic abilities, and emotional processing. This gap in research has led to a missed opportunity to understand the consequences of youth victimization, particularly within the academic setting. The current study examined whether head injury and problem behaviors mediate the relationships between victimization and suspension/expulsion using data from the Pathways to Desistance Study, a multi-site, longitudinal study of serious adolescent offenders age 14–18. A sample of male youth who had witnessed violence (n = 1,094) reported a total score of victimization, number of early behavior problems (i.e., cheating, fighting, etc.), ever having a head injury (32.9%), and number of times suspended (adjusted M = 13.13; SD = 19.31) or expelled (adjusted M = 0.65; SD = 0.99). Structural equation modeling was used to examine direct and indirect pathways from victimization to suspension and expulsion through head injury and behavior. Direct pathways from victimization to school discipline were significant; indirect pathways mediated by only head injury were not significant, but indirect pathways through only problem behavior and through TBI and problem behavior were significant for both expulsion and suspension. Results suggest that youth who have been victimized are at higher risk for both suspension and expulsion and that this risk may be, in part, explained through increased head injury and problem behaviors. TBI screenings/services for violence-exposed youth and trauma-informed school-based services may help to deter trajectories toward suspension and expulsion but should be developed with attention to the influence of racial bias on pathways to school discipline.
Behavioral problems and psychological distress among seriously delinquent youth: Assessing a mediational pathway of parental monitoring, peer delinquency and violence exposure.
The onset of behavioral problems in early childhood is associated with an increased frequency of delinquent behavior. A significant amount of youth in the juvenile justice system have histories of mental illness and psychological distress. However, little is known about what factors mediate the relationship between early onset behavioral problems and psychological distress. The present study tested the mediating effect of parental monitoring, antisocial peers, exposure to violence, and gender on the relationship between behavioral problems and psychological distress. A secondary analysis of data from the Pathways to Desistence Study was examined using the serial mediation process proposed by Preacher and Hayes, a significant mediation of the behavior problems–psychological distress relationship was found. The results supported the mediational model in which parental monitoring impacted interaction with antisocial peers which in turn increased the level of violence exposure youth experienced ultimately leading to an increase in psychological distress.
“Any alternative is great if I’m incarcerated”: A mixed-methods study of court-ordered community service in Los Angeles county.
California courts increasingly order community service for those convicted of nonviolent and minor misdemeanors or infractions, assigning unpaid work to be performed. While court-ordered community service has been used as an alternative to incarceration and the payment of fines, little is known about the monetary and personal costs for those completing it. A case study design is used to examine court-ordered community service performed in Southeast Los Angeles. Data were gathered from a quantitative dataset of 541 court files of those assigned to community service and 32 in-depth interviews with attorneys and court-ordered community service workers. While the quantitative data and Attorney interviews found that negative outcomes of community service can drive community service workers deeper into debt and result in new warrants that place defendants at risk for rearrest, individuals that completed community service appreciated the opportunity to pay off their criminal justice debts and stay out of jail.
Cultivating engagement in a virtual photovoice project on a sensitive topic.
This White Paper outlines how a researcher and two mothers of children with medical complexities created a successful virtual photovoice project that became a safe virtual space where “medical mothers” could share their experiences and strategies. The project was born out of a need for medical mothers to navigate the daily challenges they face as primary caregivers and advocates for their children. The White Paper describes their photovoice project process from start to finish, from developing a logo and online identity, to recruitment, engaging with sensitive topics, creating a successful virtual photovoice exhibit, and engaging a virtual audience. The paper concludes with a checklist of lessons learned, to inform decision-making by other virtual photovoice projects and teams. The co-creators’ process of building trust and mutual respect among the core team, with the participating mothers, and with the medical and social services community in San Diego and beyond, is certain to inspire empathetic approaches to photovoice decision-making by future virtual projects that use photovoice to explore sensitive topics.
Work, pay, or go to jail: Court-ordered community service in Los Angeles.
Herrera, L., Koonse, T., Sonsteng-Person, M., & Zatz, N. (2019, October). Work, pay, or go to jail: Court-ordered community service in Los Angeles. University of California, Labor Center.
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