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Social Work vocabulary · Ethics and Confidentiality

Professional boundaries

Meaning in social work, with examples

nounCommon term

In social work, professional boundaries means: The limits that keep the relationship between a worker and a client professional, for example around gifts, personal contact, social media and sharing personal information.

In Turkish: mesleki sınırlar

How it is used

A frequent topic in supervision and codes of conduct. Workers keep, maintain or cross boundaries, and a boundary violation is a serious breach. Small kindnesses are fine, but the relationship exists for the client's benefit.

Example sentences

  1. Accepting a friend request from a client would cross professional boundaries.

  2. We talked about professional boundaries in supervision after the family invited me to a wedding.

Common collocations

  • maintain professional boundaries
  • cross professional boundaries
  • boundary violation
  • clear boundaries
  • code of ethicsA written set of values and principles that guides how members of a profession should behave and make decisions.
  • conflict of interestA situation in which a worker's personal interests or relationships could affect, or seem to affect, their professional judgement.
  • supervisionRegular protected meetings in which a social worker discusses cases, decisions, workload, learning and wellbeing with a more experienced manager or colleague.
  • duty of careThe legal and ethical responsibility to act in a way that keeps people in your care safe and does not cause them avoidable harm.

More terms: Ethics and Confidentiality

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