The Research Division
The Research Division
Researchers and fellows are going to conduct studies relating to "the Realization of an Inclusive Society" by using the scientific research funds, the strategic individual research funds of Otsuma Women's University, collaborative research projects, and other grants. The following are our main ongoing researches:
"Research on clarification of knowledge and skills of job coaches and development of a standardized evaluation criteria of their professional abilities"
The representative researcher is Hiroshi Ogawa. Co-researchers are Tetsuo Fukushima, Keisuke Yamatsuta, Shuji Honda, and Isao Wakabayashi.
While job coaches are supposed to be professional personnel of supported employment for persons with disabilities and the effects and necessity of the job coaching has been widely recognized, the job contents, needed knowledge, and required skills have still remained unclear. The vagueness of their expertise is one of the problems for job coaches. In this research, firstly we are going to clarify needed knowledge and skills for job coaches through an interview research, then develop a Japanese version of the checklist of professional abilities needed for job coaches by using and sorting examples from test items of the Certified Employment Support Professional examination in the United States. Finally, we will conduct a research for about 500 job coaches by using the developed checklist to give an account of elements and structures of required knowledge and skills for job coaches, based on the kinds of disability, parent organizations of job coaches, and so on.
"The development of an information sharing support tool using ICT for students who have difficulties in being employed"
The representative researcher is Hiroshi Ogawa. Co-researchers are Tetsuo Fukushima, Tomomi Kurano, Michiko Yamaga.
We are going to develop a system to support students diagnosed and/or suspected of having developmental disabilities to be able to get employed. This system will share students' basic information and useful information for career choice with students, teachers, and other concerned personnel. To begin with, we will sort out the information to be included in the system, then the students who need supports will input information such as their own personal history, strong and weak points, and vocational interests. As a trial, the information will be shared with the University personnel whom the students will chose. While our ultimate intention is that the information will be shared with personnel of companies, employment support organizations, and/or medical agencies, during the fiscal year of 2019, we are going to focus on information sharing within the University personnel to clarify the kinds and qualities of gathered information, the orientation of students towards the information sharing, the needed accommodations, and the merits of sharing the information using this system.
"Practical research on development of psychological counselors and their supervisors"
The representative researcher is Tetsuo Fukushima.
As a basic study for fostering supervisors of psychological counselors, this research intends to practically define the developmental process of the supervisors and make the process as a clue to find an effective way of the fostering. It will be a practical research through meta-supervises, in which both junior to mid-level supervisors and expert supervisors will specifically and continuously examine supervise sessions, to have a wider effect on the helpfulness of the outcomes.
"The Socio-Esthetic care for the elder people and examination of its effectiveness"
The representative researcher is Keisuke Yamatsuta.
The Socio-Esthetic care is defined as "a comprehensive esthetic care for persons who have mental, physical, and/or social difficulties based on medical and welfare knowledge in terms of humanitarian and welfare perspectives." (The Association of Japanese Estheticians and Beauty Therapists) When it applies for the elder persons and cancer sufferers, it intends to improve the persons' physical and psychological health and their QOL. But the effect of the care has reported only anecdotally and there has been no empirical research on it. This research will examine short-term and long-term effects of the Socio-Esthetic care in a welfare institution for elderly people.
