Applying evidence in practice: isn't that straight-forward?

Judgement and decision-making lie at the heart of practice and are feats that practitioners performunder conditions that are complex and uncertain, the attainment of positive outcomes for service usersdependent upon the aptitude of those charged with the task and the scaffolding provided by their employingorganisations. Faced with such a challenge, social workers somehow avoid paralysis and takeaction to support and protect those with whom they work, drawing on experience, skill, information, andintervention evidence. The way they negotiate, orientate, interpret, and apply this knowledge is oftenthrough unconscious thought processes that require illumination and balance. This chapter considers howpractitioners make sense of the situations that they come into contact with and discusses the intuitiveanalyticalreasoning continuum integral to this. Attention is given to the role of value as an influenceupon perception and subsequent interpretation, together with the role played by cognitive processes.