Ecological Assessment

Ecological assessment is an inclusive approach to the collection of data in practice. Simply said, the ecological model is a systematic framework that helps the social worker make the most complete investigation possible into the many interrelated factors associated with any particular case. As Carol Germain has stated: “The ecological approach to people-environment transactions is probably the most encompassing metaphor … an easier way of grasping the reciprocal influences of people and environments in human development and functioning” (p. 407).1

Social workers traditionally have applied the ecological, “person-in-environment” perspective to assessment.2 In social work practice, assessment has essentially been a “social diagnosis” in which the client system and its environment are studied and used to develop a plan of intervention.3 In ecological assessment, ...