Anknytningsteori i praktiken : en intervjustudie med socialarbetare i spädbarnsverksamheter.

Sammanfattning: The aim of this study is to explore how child welfare social workers interpret Attachment Theory, how it is understood as a treatment tool in practice and what similarities and differences can be identified in those practices. The method chosen for this study was qualitative interviews with four professional child welfare social workers, from three different welfare organizations working with infants. A social constructivist perspective and Malcolm Payne’s conceptualisation of formal and informal theories served as the theoretical framework in analysing the empirical results. The theories were applied to understand how the social workers construct the significance and role of the Attachment Theory in practice. This study did distinguish and identify both similarities and differences in the application of the practice. The common features mainly covered the framework for parenting and how attachment can be observed. The differences that was discerned were the varying construction of the meaning of attachment, different views of which factors could stimulate attachment and how the social workers’ experience and standardized assessment tools themselves create these differences. This study has therefore additionally attempted to discuss the impact of standardization in social welfare.