How is a genogram used?
The genogram is constructed with a combination of lines and genogram symbols that map how individuals are connected to their biological family as well as their associated network of friends, work connections, and even pets. These individuals are named and any relevant information about them is added, including:
Date of birth/date of death
Employment and income
Ethnicity, gender
Family secrets
Immigration status
Marital status
Medical, mental health, and substance abuse issues
Personality
Quality of each family relationship
Role in family
Sexual orientation
Trauma
ECOMAP-An ecomap in social work (also referred to as eco map or eco-map) is a visual representation of all the different systems impacting an individual’s or family’s life.
People interact with multiple other entities regularly, including friends, extended family, work, school, recreational clubs, medical professionals, etc.
This is the person’s “ecosystem.” Eco mapping in social work makes that ecosystem easier to understand and provides more insights into the relationships themselves.
For example, if a social worker is providing clinical therapy and referral services for someone that is a habitual drug user, they will want to see what influences are in their life that can either help or hinder their recovery.
An ecomap example social work assessment allows that social worker to immediately identify the stressful or negative influences in that person’s life, as well as those that are positive and areas of support. This is indicated by the use of connector lines and how they look. (We’ll cover this next.)
An eco map social work assessment is sometimes confused with a genogram because some types of social work genograms will use the same types of relationship lines.
What Do Eco Maps in Social Work Look Like?
Many sample ecomap images that you see will represent the ecomap social work visual as one big circle with several smaller circles surrounding it.
The circle in the center of the social work ecomap template will be for the individual or family being assessed. The smaller surrounding circles will be used to indicate the ecosystem of that family or individual.
Between the circles in the eco map social work example will be connector lines. The type of line you use will indicate the emotional impact of that relationship.
ecomap social work example lines
The three standard line types that are used are:
Solid line: Positive relationship
Dashed line: Weak or tenuous relationship
Jagged line: Stressful relationship
You can color the lines as well if you like to enhance your ecomap social work example report to be more comprehensive. Some ecomaps also use arrows with lines to represent resources or energy flow between connections.
Here’s how the whole social work ecomap example template looks when the circles and lines are put together.
Sample-eco-map-social-work-min
What Types of Connections Should You Include in Your Ecomap Social Work Template?
For your ecomap template social work report, you can include any influencing entities in the ecosystem of your client. It’s helpful if you separate them into two groups – one being friends and the other being community.
The community group in your ecomap example social work template can include things like:
School
Work
Church
Hobbies
Sports activities
Social service agencies
Medical health services
Clubs
What about family?
Family connections are also very important, and they can be included in the ecomap for one person by putting them in smaller circles surrounding the larger one. If you are doing an ecomap for a family, then you can just include all family member names in the main circle.