Effects of Peer Group Counselling and Sex on the self-concept of Secondary School Adolescents: Implications for Counselling.

Abstract

The study investigated the efficacy of peer group counselling in enhancing the self-concept of secondary school adolescents in Benin City, Edo State, Nigeria. The influence of sex on the self-concept of these adolescents was also investigated. A pre-test, post test, control group design was employed in the study. Sixty-eight senior secondary school II students, randomly selected from three randomly selected public secondary schools (a boys’ school, a girls’ school and a coeducational school) participated in the study. A 40-item adolescent self concept scale (ASCS) adapted from Akinboye (1977) Adolescent Personal Data Inventory (APDI) was validated and used to measure the self- concept of the participants. A correlation coefficient r = 0.76 was obtained using the test-retest reliability method to establish the stability of the instrument. Three hypotheses were formulated for the study and tested at .05 level of significance. Data collected were analysed using the Students’ t-statistic and analysis of variance (ANOVA).The results of the study revealed that peer group counselling had a significant positive effect on the self-concept of the adolescents. There was no significant effect of sex on the self concept of the adolescents. Further analysis also revealed no interactive effect of treatment and sex on the self concept of the adolescents. The implications of these results for school counselling are exhaustively discussed and recommendations made.

Key words: peer group counselling, sex, self-concept, counselling