My name in Sarah Boeh and I am a Master of Applied Social Work student with Massey University in Palmerston North. As part of my degree requirement, I am conducting a research report focusing on New Zealand social workers' use of trauma-informed approaches in their interactions with parents and whānau of the children in their care.

There is a growing awareness of and commitment to trauma informed practice (TIP) within social work both internationally and in New Zealand. Existing research has looked at ways to implement TIP in many different fields but it is somewhat limited in the child and family field of practice and even more so in the New Zealand context. Interestingly, New Zealand’s statutory agency, Oranga Tamariki have declared a commitment to being child centered and trauma informed. To date, however, there has been little agreement on how the relevant terms and practice frameworks are defined and developed to ensure that this commitment is realized. However, before such frameworks can be developed, there needs to be some understanding of the current level of TIP in New Zealand. This study sets out to explore the extent to which trauma informed approaches are currently utilised in social workers' interactions with the parents and whānau of the children their care.
 
You have received this invitation to participate because you are a member of ANZASW or it was sent to you from other contacts. To participate in this online survey, you will need to be a qualified social worker who is currently working with children and their families and whānau for more than two years in New Zealand. The survey will take approximately 15 minutes to complete and your involvement is completely voluntary and anonymous. You will have the right to decline to answer any question at any point in the survey and by submitting the completed survey at the end you would be consenting to participate in the project. The last day to participate in this survey is September 6th.

If you would like to receive a copy of the summary of the research outcome, you can send me an individual email: Sarah.Boeh.1@uni.massey.ac.nz. Otherwise, a copy of the summary will be given to ANZASW upon completion of the research for them to circulate to their members.

If you have any questions about this research, please contact me, my supervisor or course coordinator:

Student Researcher:
Sarah Boeh
MASW Student
Sarah.Boeh.1@uni.massey.ac.nz

Research Supervisor
Dr. Polly Yeung
School of Social Work Massey University Palmerston North
06 3569099 xtn 83514 p.yeung@massey.ac.nz

Course Coordinator
Dr. Kathryn Hay
School of Social Work Massey University Palmerston North
06 356 9099 xtn 83518 k.s.hay@massey.ac.nz

This project has been evaluated by peer review and judged to be low risk.  Consequently, it has not been reviewed by one of the University’s Human Ethics Committees.  The researcher(s) named above are responsible for the ethical conduct of this research. If you have any concerns about the conduct of this research that you wish to raise with someone other than the researcher(s), please contact Prof Craig Johnson, Director, Research Ethics, telephone 06 356 9099 x 85271, email humanethics@massey.ac.nz.