The purpose of this study was to examine how a psychodrama-based group counseling affected the self-esteem and interpersonal anxiety of school children, as the importance of self-positive attitude and interpersonal experience was accentuated in early ...
The purpose of this study was to examine how a psychodrama-based group counseling affected the self-esteem and interpersonal anxiety of school children, as the importance of self-positive attitude and interpersonal experience was accentuated in early adolescence from a developmental perspective and psychodrama was intriguing for elementary schoolers in the upper grades. After relevant theories and earlier studies were reviewed, two hypotheses were formulated:
1. A psychodrama group counseling program might have an effect on the self-esteem of upper graders in elementary school.
2. A psychodrama group counseling program might have an effect on easing the interpersonal anxiety of upper graders in elementary school.
The subjects in this study were 40 sixth-grade students in an elementary school located in the suburbs of Ulsan. Out of them, 10 students who wanted to participate in a psychodrama group counseling program were grouped into an experimental group, and the other 30 students were selected as a control group. Group counseling was provided by using psychodrama techniques to the experimental group 10 times, twice a week, 60 minutes each. The group counseling lasted 10 hours in total, and no action was taken for the control group.
The instruments used in this study were self-esteem inventory and interpersonal anxiety inventory. After pretest and posttest were conducted, descriptive statistics was utilized to obtain statistical data on mean and standard deviation, and MANCOVA was employed by using SPSS/Window 11.5 program to make another statistical analysis. To improve the reliability of the quantitative research, the students were asked to write down about their experiences in each session, and the observation record written by the counselor was analyzed.
The findings of the study were as follows:
The experimental group that was exposed to the psychodrama group counseling program got significantly higher scores in social and general self-esteem, two of self-esteem subfactors, and in general interpersonal anxiety and friends-related interpersonal anxiety, two of interpersonal anxiety subfactors. But there was no significant intergroup gap in home- related self-esteem, school-related self-esteem, social interpersonal anxiety and intersexual anxiety. Therefore it's concluded that the psychodrama group counseling program was effective at boosting the social and general self-esteem of the upper graders and alleviating their general and friend-related interpersonal anxiety, two of the interpersonal anxiety subfactors.
Meanwhile, earlier studies that applied psychodrama have mostly focused on college students, high schoolers and special groups including outpatients, hospitalized patients, juvenile delinquents and children in need of special education. However, psychodrama-based counseling that consists of role playing and play activities basically aims to provide school children who lack attention and verbal expressiveness with inclusive intervention that is comprehensive of cognitive, emotional and behavioral domains. Group counseling based on psychodrama marked by spontaneity and creativity is one of efficient group counseling types that should be more widespread to nurture independent and creative people in response to the needs of future society.