Citation

Ulugtekin SS, Acar YB. Int. J. Humanit. Soc. Sci. 2011; 1(3): 199-203.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, Center for Promoting Ideas)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

As a community-based treatment form, probation is a new and undevelopment, but, a rapidly developing field of social work in Turkey. This article seeks to provide a brief assessment of this new field in addition to investigating whether social workers function as change agents and also include information related to this role while writing their probation reports. Payne's (1997) systems model formed the conceptual framework while analyzing content of probation reports. Probation reports obtained from four different juvenile courts in Turkey and, for the current study, researchers analyzed 926 probation reports of 219 children. Major research findings showed that as change agents, probation officers mainly excercise enabling role followed by facilitating and teaching roles. Mediating and educating roles, which are essential roles while working and including the environment in the probation process, are also practiced rarely. It was also interesting that organizing role was never undertaken by probation officers. Being the first study to examine probation process in Turkey constitutes the significance of this present article. Another significance of this study is that it reflects the process of probation in a different cultural context. It is hoped that this study will encourage the building of bridges between researchers and those take role actively in the field of juvenile justice system.

Language: en