The relevance of HBSE is justified by the fact that HBSE curriculum provides knowledge relevant to multiple social work roles. In particular, social workers must possess a solid grounding in the human behavior science as well as understand well the biological, social, psychological, and spiritual needs of people at different stages of their development. Next, social workers need to know how various aspects of external environment, particularly those reflected in the state social welfare system, bring about desirable or undesirable behavior patterns. According to Sallebey (2001 in van Wormer, 2007), social workers are obliged to understand the forces that drive and shape, obstruct and constrain the experiences of human beings. In relation to this, HBSE equips social workers with knowledge that will help them chart through the complex issues of human experience. It enhances social workers’ practical knowledge by providing insight into the reciprocal relationships that exist between the behavior of humans and social environment. Since the course in HBSE provides core knowledge of social sciences, it is a good guidance for the generalist social work practice. And as generalists, social workers require a broad range of skills and knowledge to help individuals with a wide array of issues and resolve versatile problems.
It should be noted that HBSE is essentially unique if to compare it with other social science disciplines. It strives to provide a foundation of knowledge necessary for understanding of how humans adapt to the changes in the social environment and how they respond to complex social, psychological, and biological demands. In this way, HBSE focuses on human adaptation and sees it as the key aspect of social work. HBSE provides knowledge of how to help humans adapt and thrive in social environments that change through exploring their capacity of the developmental flexibility (Ashford & LeCroy, 2012).
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"Why is HBSE Relevant to Social Work?".
- Ashford, J. & LeRoy, C. (2012). Brooks/Cole Empowerment Series: Human Behavior in the Social Environment. Cengage Learning.
- Van Wormer, K. (2007). Human behavior and the social environment, micro Level: Individuals and families. Oxford University Press.
