Going up? - En kvantitativ studie av socionomstudenters tankar om karriär

Sammanfattning: This study examines the thoughts and expectations of social work students regarding their future career. In order to investigate this, a questionnaire was handed out to social work students (N=203) attending their final semester of the social work program (socionomprogrammet) at Göteborgs universitet, Högskolan i Jönköping, Högskolan i Kristianstad, Linnéuniversitetet and Malmö Högskola. The questionnaire was divided in to three parts, each part representing a different theme. Two of the themes examined diverse perspectives on “how” and “where” the students wanted to do career. The third theme investigated which factors the students meant had influenced them considering their view upon their future career. To analyze the collected data, theories regarding career and professions were used. In addition, the sociological perspectives of Pierre Bourdieu were applied to the results. Regarding the question “how”, we found that our study group tended to lean towards either a spiral career or an expert career. Concerning the question “where”, the respondents seemed to think that work in social services was a good way to enter the field of social work. The factors that the students meant influenced them the most regarding their future career appeared to be connected to the part of the social work field where the actual work takes place. In contrast to this, the parts of the social work field that are connected to studying the field, was not considered as equally important by the students.