- Only two in five (41%) British adults think of social workers as important providers of mental health support – whereas 69% identify psychiatrists and 65% identified GPs.
- Only a third of people know that social workers are usually involved in deciding whether someone should be detained under the Mental Health Act (33%), or that they often give evidence in legal proceedings (33%), and just less than half know that they can help to find accommodation (47%), get funding for people in financial difficulty (43%), or provide talking therapies (48%) as part of their core role.
- Over a quarter of British adults mistakenly think that mental health social workers provide personal care like washing and dressing (27%) or do household jobs like cooking and cleaning (29%), and three in ten (30%) think that they provide childcare.
