Management Of Psychosocial Problems Of Adolescents In Some Orphanages In South-West Nigeria

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the relative effectiveness of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy and Reality Therapy in managing adolescent psychosocial problems such as low self-esteem, depression, aggression and anxiety. The moderating effect of gender was also examined. A total of 150 adolescents with mean age of 17.8 years drawn from three orphanages in Lagos and Ogun States of Nigeria constituted the final sample. They were made up of 81 males and $9 females. The study utilized an experimental design using the pretest-posttest control group design. Four research instruments were used to generate relevant data for the study. These were: Index of Self-Esteem (ISE) by Hudson (1982), Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire (ATQ) by Kendall and Hollon (1980), Verbal Aggressive Scale (VAS) by Infante and Wigleylll (1986) and Social Anxiety Thoughts Questionnaire (SAT) by Hartman (1984). Six hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. Data collected from the various instruments were treated statistically using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) was the statistical tool employed. Testing of the hypotheses was set at 0.05 levels of significance.