Clinical and Professional Reasoning in Occupational Therapy

by Barbara Schell, John Schell

Schell & Schell’s Clinical and Professional Reasoning in Occupational Therapy, 2nd Edition offers up-to-date, easy-to-understand coverage of the theories and insights gained from years of studying how occupational therapy practitioners reason in practice. Written by an expanded team of international educators, researchers and practitioners, the book is the only work that goes beyond simply directing how therapists should think to exploring why and how they actually think the way they do when working with clients. The 2nd Edition offers a wide array of new chapters and a new, more focused four-part organization that helps Occupational Therapy students develop the skills they need to identify and solve challenges throughout their careers. Case Examples demonstrate how effective reasoning is applied in handling a range of clinical and professional issues.

464 pages, Paperback

First published November 3, 2011

Reviews

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

The terminology wasn't clear enough to be immediately helpful, but a nice synthesis of thought in OT on reasoning and teaching reasoning.

[Justin · Rating 2 out of 5]

More evidence free BS complete with mutually inclusive categories for what the authors term "professional reasoning." As with MOHO, PEO or any of the other pseudoscientific theories that abound in OT, my professors expect me to regurgitate this nonsense every time I write a paper. I was expected to do clinical case reviews, identifying the different types of reasoning employed by the clinician. I and my fellow students were always stumped because we ended up being able to identify three or four types of reasoning to each case, thus making for very weak construct validity. But in terms of validity, the typology here is in good company with the rest of OT theory, which suffers from the same lack of intellectual rigor, practical necessity, or clinical justification. We have been told time and again, that these vacuous exercises in sophistry make us sound like "more serious professionals" to the denizens of other disciplines, but I think the effect is quite the opposite. The overriding message is that OT's are so insecure as professionals, that we cannot feel comfortable borrowing and applying knowledge from other disciplines that would be far more relevant. No, we must reinvent the wheel again and again. So long as an OT invented the theory at hand, and frequently uses the term "occupation" ad nauseum, we may be sure that no one will muscle in on our academic turf. The problem is that anyone with a brain knows that that fuzzy-headed logic will not fly outside of the self-congratulatory bubble of the backslapping, inbred, OT world. Now, what kind of reasoning did I just use to make my argument? Oh, Logical Reasoning and Critical Thinking. Alas, these were not covered in my program or in any OT theory I have had the pleasure to study.