EFFECTS OF SOCIAL SKILLS TRAINING ON ABUSE OF CONTRACEPTIVES AND ABORTION AMONG IN-SCHOOL FEMALE ADOLESCENTS IN OWERRI NORTH, IMO STATE, NIGERIA
Abstract
This study investigated the effects of Social Skills Training (SST) on abuse of contraceptive and illegal abortion among in-school female adolescents in Owerri North, Imo State, Nigeria. The study specifically determined whether students assigned to experimental and control groups significantly differ in abuse of contraceptives and illegal abortion behaviours before and after exposure to SST. Adopting a pretest-posttest experimental control research design, the study used a true experimental research design. The population consisted of fifty-two Senior School two students in Owerri North Area's public secondary school identified as having high levels of sexual risk-taking activities. Fourty-six in-school female teenagers were sampled using simple random sampling procedures and purposeful sampling (control group = 23 and experimental group = 23). The students signed the consent forms and participated in the study with the consent of the parents and the school authority. Sexual Risk- Taking Behaviour Screening Questionnaire (SRTBSQ, r= 0.84) and Female Adolescents Risk-Taking Behaviour Questionnaire (FARTBQ, α = 0.72) were used for data collection. Both content and construct validity were established for the instrument. Both pre- and post-tests were administered to the participants in both groups. For eight weeks, the experimental group got SST in sixteen sessions, whereas the control group also received regular English language instruction for eight weeks. The t-test for independent samples was used to test the hypotheses, and descriptive statistics (mean and standard deviation) were employed to answer the study questions. The results indicated that the in-school adolescents in both the experimental and control groups had high level of abuse of contraceptives and illegal abortion at baseline, but improve for the experimental group after exposure to SST. There was a significant difference between the experimental and control groups on posttest mean scores of abuses of contraceptives and illegal abortion behaviours at p = 0.000. The study inferred that SST significantly reduced abuse of contraceptives and illegal abortion behaviours. The study recommended for inclusion of SST into teaching strategies in the secondary school curriculum.
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