Centennial Honors College
Western Illinois University
Undergraduate Research Day 2012
Poster Presentation
Attitudes of Social Workers vs. Non Social Workers Concerning Poverty
Alden Braddock and Amy Handlon
Faculty Mentor: Debra Allwardt
Social Work
Our study will compare the attitudes of social work and criminal justice majors towards
poverty in America. Previous research has indicated that social work students tend to
view the root causes of poverty as environmental rather than individual factors. We feel
that as social work majors we should have an understanding of how students in our own
field and in other workforce areas perceive poverty because this reflects how they will
handle issues related to poverty when they join the workforce. To accomplish this, we
created a survey of closed-ended questions about the causes of poverty, personal
experiences with poverty, and opinions about how the government should address
issues of poverty. The survey was administered to junior and senior level students in
social work and in law enforcement courses. We are currently analyzing the results of
this survey. Our poster will detail the differences between responses of social work
students and law enforcement students. We will offer conclusions about how these
results can be used to better work with people living in poverty.