Katja Kuusisto
- Associate Professor (tenure track)
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Tampere University
- +358401909846
- katja.kuusisto@tuni.fi
-
Wednesday 11-12AM
- https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8523-9675
- CV:
About me
Adjunct Professor in social work, University of Jyväskylä
Field of expertise
Substance abuse and its treatment
Treatment effectiveness
Recovery, especially spontaneous recovery
Client's self-efficacy expectations and expectations towards treatment
Working alliance
Client's and therapist's gender, impact on client-therapist relationship
Quantitative, qualitative and triangulative research methods
University pedagogy, especially web-based learning, guidance, assessment
Research topics
social work: substance abuse treatment, therapists, clients, treatment effectiveness, recovery, social work with adults, therapeutic social work, legal issues
university pedagogy: web-based learning, blended learning, guidance, assessment
Research unit
Faculty of Social Sciences, social work, Tampere University
Research fields
social work, social sciences, psychotherapy, psychology, university pedagogy
- Usability of substance abuse client segmentation in service planning and its effects on client well-being and substance abuse
- Finnish Social Work students’ practice experiences in comparison with Ireland and Australia (2019-)
- Gambling as part of a regional experience economy concept: A socio-cultural analysis of the new Tampere casino
- Rights of substance abusing clients – new tools of the Social Welfare Act 1301/2015 (2017-)
- Change in client's well-being and rehabilitation activities in inpatient substance abuse treatment (2017-)
- Client satisfaction in social work at the social welfare offices (2014-2018)
- Effectiveness of substance abuse treatment in light of common factors [Päihdehoidon toimivuus yleisten tekijöiden valossa] (the Academy of Finland 2007-2010)
Kirsi Gunther
- Visiting Researcher
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Tampere University
- +358503186075
- kirsi.gunther@tuni.fi

Eeva Ekqvist
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Tampere University
- +358504377120
- eeva.ekqvist@tuni.fi
Laura Kalliomaa-Puha
- Professor
- (sosiaalioikeus)
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Tampere University
- +358408288601
- laura.kalliomaa-puha@tuni.fi
Johanna Ranta
- University Lecturer
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Tampere University
- +358505099193
- johanna.ranta@tuni.fi
Research fields
- institutional interaction and practices in substance use and mental health services
- low-threshold services for people using drugs
- harm reduction and psychosocial approach in substance use services
- home-based services for people using drugs
- homelessness and Housing First model
- qualitative research methods, especially mobile ethnography, ethnomethodology and discursive approaches
- Anonymous encounters on illegal paths: An ethnographic study of the dark web and street-based harm reduction services for people using drugs (Kone Foundation, 2021–2025)
- Fighting segregation and homelessness among the most vulnerable through housing social work (Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, 2021–2023)
- From Demolished Housing Community to New Homes (City of Tampere, Academy of Finland, 2021–2022)
- COVID-19 in the margins of society - Homelessness-sub-project (European Social Fund, 2021–2023)
- Geographies of Home-based Service Interactions at the Margins of Welfare in Finland and Sweden (Academy of Finland, 2017–2022)
- Responsibilisation of Service Users and Professionals in Mental Health Practices (Academy of Finland, 2011–2016)
Doctoral thesis
Ranta, Johanna (2020) Suhteellinen toimijuus huumeita käyttävien matalan kynnyksen palveluissa: Tutkimus institutionaalisesta vuorovaikutuksesta [Relational agency in low-threshold services for people using drugs: A study of institutional interaction]. Tampere University Dissertations 279. Tampere: Tampere University. [Open access]
Peer-reviewed scientific publications
Juhila, Kirsi & Ranta, Johanna & Ilmoniemi, Mikko & Mäki, Jenni (forthcoming 2023) Paikastaan siirretyt: Kotipaikan menettäminen ja uuteen kiinnittyminen gentrifikaatioprosessissa. In Suvi Raitakari, Timo Harrikari, Marja Hekkala & Minna Kivipelto (eds.) Sosiaalityö poikkeuksellisissa olosuhteissa ja kriiseissä.
Holmberg, Suvi & Ranta, Johanna (2022) Kotona katkolla: Asiakkaan arki osana kotiin vietävää katkaisuhoitoa [Detoxification at home: Client’s everyday life as a part of home-based alcohol detoxification]. In Suvi Raitakari & Kirsi Günther & Jenni-Mari Räsänen (eds.) Koti, hyvinvointityö ja haavoittuvuus [Home, welfare work and vulnerability]. Tampere: Tampere University Press, 285–316. [Open access]
Juhila, Kirsi & Raitakari, Suvi & Ranta, Johanna (2022) Housing First: Combatting Long-term Homelessness in Finland. In Caroline de La Porte, Guðný Björk Eydal, Jaakko Kauko, Daniel Nohrstedt, Paul ‘t Hart & Bent Sofus Tranøy (eds.) Successful Public Policy in the Nordic Countries: Cases, Lessons, Challenges. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 495–513. [Open access]
Juhila, Kirsi & Ranta, Johanna & Holmberg, Suvi (2022) Kotiin paikantuvan tutkimuksen metodologisia lähtökohtia [Methodological premises of home-based research]. In Suvi Raitakari & Kirsi Günther & Jenni-Mari Räsänen (eds.) Koti, hyvinvointityö ja haavoittuvuus [Home, welfare work and vulnerability]. Tampere: Tampere University Press, 85–119. [Open access]
Ranta, Johanna & Kuusisto, Katja (2022) Julkinen keskustelu suomalaisen päihdepalvelujärjestelmän puutteista: Analyysi mielipidekirjoitusten retoriikasta vuosina 2019–2021 [Public debate on the shortcomings of the Finnish substance use services: Analysis of the rhetoric of opinion pieces in 2019–2021]. In Arja Jokinen, Suvi Raitakari & Johanna Ranta (eds.) Sosiaalityö yhteiskunnan marginaaleissa: Konstruktionistisia jäsennyksiä [Social work at the margins of society: Constructionist perspectives]. Tampere: Vastapaino, 301–342. [Open access]
Ranta, Johanna & Perälä, Riikka (2022) Haittojen vähentäminen ja Asunto ensin -malli huumeita käyttävien asumisen tuessa [Harm reduction and Housing First model in floating support for people using drugs]. Teoksessa Suvi Raitakari & Kirsi Günther & Jenni-Mari Räsänen (eds.) Koti, hyvinvointityö ja haavoittuvuus [Home, welfare work and vulnerability]. Tampere: Tampere University Press, 181–215. [Open access]
Ranta, Johanna & Räsänen, Jenni-Mari & Raitakari, Suvi & Juhila, Kirsi (2022) Home as a risk environment: Negotiating the boundaries of homes and social relationships in services for people using illicit drugs. International Journal of Social Welfare. First published 19 August 2022. https://doi.org/10.1111/ijsw.12557 [Open access]
Holmberg, Suvi & Ranta, Johanna (2021) Koti katkaisuhoidon tilana [Home as a space for detoxification]. Janus 29(1), 54–70. [Open access]
Juhila, Kirsi & Ranta, Johanna & Raitakari, Suvi & Banks, Sarah (2021) Relational autonomy and service choices in social worker-client conversations in an outpatient clinic for people using drugs. British Journal of Social Work 15(1), 170–186.
Lydahl, Doris & Holmberg, Suvi & Günther, Kirsi & Ranta, Johanna (2021) Doing data together: Affective relations and mobile ethnography in home visits. Qualitative Research 21(4), 515–530. [Open access]
Raitakari, Suvi & Ranta, Johanna & Saario, Sirpa (2021) Alignment and service user participation in low-threshold meetings with people using drugs. In Kirsi Juhila, Tanja Dall, Christopher Hall & Juliet Koprowska (eds.) Interprofessional collaboration and service user participation: Analysing meetings in social welfare. Bristol: Policy Press, 115–140.
Ranta, Johanna (2020) Reducing harms through interactions: Workers orienting to unpredictable frames in a low-threshold project for people injecting drugs. International Journal of Drug Policy 82,102828.
Ranta, Johanna & Juhila, Kirsi (2020) Constructing a sense of home in floating support for people using drugs. Qualitative Social Work 19(4), 685–700. Published online 02 May 2019. DOI: 10.1177/1473325019847262
Kuusisto, Katja & Ranta, Johanna (2020) Psykososiaalisen päihdetyön asema Suomessa 1900-luvulta tähän päivään [The position of psychosocial substance use work in Finland from the 20th century to the present]. Teoksessa Johanna Moilanen, Johanna Annola & Mirja Satka (toim.) Sosiaalityön käänteet [Twists of social work]. Jyväskylä: SoPhi 144, 112–140. [Open access]
Günther, Kirsi & Ranta, Johanna (2019) Mielenterveys- ja päihdekuntoutujan palvelusiirtymät: Asumisyksikön työntekijöiden neuvottelut asiakkaiden muuttuvista palvelutarpeista [Service transitions of people with mental health and substance use problems: Housing support workers negotiating clients’ changing service needs]. Teoksessa Aini Pehkonen, Taru Kekoni & Katja Kuusisto (toim.) Oikeus päihdehuoltoon [Right for substance use services]. Tampere: Vastapaino, 219–252.
Ranta, Johanna (2019) Huumehoitoa koskevat neuvot ja valinnat matalan kynnyksen palvelun asiakkaiden ja työntekijöiden vuorovaikutuksessa [Advices and choices regarding drug addiction treatment in low-threshold service client-worker interaction]. Teoksessa Aini Pehkonen, Taru Kekoni & Katja Kuusisto (toim.) Oikeus päihdehuoltoon [Right for substance use services]. Tampere: Vastapaino, 253–287.
Ranta, Johanna & Raitakari, Suvi & Juhila, Kirsi (2017) Vastuuneuvottelut huumeidenkäyttäjien asunnottomuuden toiminnallisissa loukuissa [Negotiating responsibilities in the double binds of drug users' homelessness]. Yhteiskuntapolitiikka 82(2), 165–175. [Open access]
Edited publications
Jokinen, Arja & Raitakari, Suvi & Ranta, Johanna (eds.) (2022) Sosiaalityö yhteiskunnan marginaaleissa: Konstruktionistisia jäsennyksiä [Social work at the margins of society: Constructionist perspectives]. Tampere: Vastapaino. [Open access]
Juhila, Kirsi & Hansen Löfstrand, Cecilia & Ranta, Johanna (eds.) (2021) Home- and Community-Based Work at the Margins of Welfare: Balancing between Disciplinary, Participatory and Caring Approaches. Social Inclusion 9(3), thematic issue. [Open access]
Ranta, Johanna & Räsänen, Jenni-Mari & Günther, Kirsi (eds.) (2018) Sosiaalityön kodit ja kodit sosiaalityössä [Social Work’s Homes and Homes in Social Work]. Tutkiva sosiaalityö 2018 [Researching Social Work 2018]. Helsinki: Talentia and The Finnish Society of Social Work Research. [Open access]
Other publications
See TUNIcris

Pasi-Heikki Rannisto
- Research Director
- Faculty of Management and Business
- Tampere University
- +358405578981
- pasi-heikki.rannisto@tuni.fi
Virpi Sillanpää
- University Instructor
- Tietojohtaminen
- Faculty of Management and Business
- Tampere University
- virpi.sillanpaa@tuni.fi