Adjustment Strategies of Widows to Widowhood Stress Based on Their Age: The Case of Rivers State, Nigeria (Published)
This study was aimed at investigating influence of age on adjustment strategies employed by widows in coping with widowhood stress in Rivers State, Nigeria. Descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. Two research questions and one hypothesis guided the conduct of the study at 0.05 probability level. A sample of 370 widows in Rivers State was drawn from the population via proportional stratified random sampling technique. Two instruments namely; Stress Level Scale for Widows (SLSW) and Questionnaire for Widows Adjustment Strategies (QWAS), both developed by the researcher were used for data collection. Data were analysed with mean, standard deviation and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Hypothesis was tested at 0.05 level of significance and the statistical package known as SPSS for widows was employed for the analyses. Results showed that; all the eight adjustment strategies (problem solving, cognitive restructuring, express emotion, social support, problem avoidance, wishful thinking, self-criticism and social withdrawal) are adopted by widows in ameliorating widowhood stress; there are slight differences among the mean values of the different age groups with regards to all the adjustment strategies of widows to widowhood stress. Based on the findings of this study, recommendations were made accordingly.
Keywords: Adjustment, Age, Rivers State, Strategies., Stress, Widowhood
EFFECTS OF COGNITIVE AND RATIONAL EMOTIVE BEHAVIOUR THERAPIES ON DRUG ABUSE OF SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN IBADAN (Published)
This study investigated the effects of cognitive behaviour therapy and rational emotive behaviour therapy on drug abuse of senior secondary school students in Ibadan, Nigeria. The study adopted a pretest-posttest, control group Quasi-experimental design. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 120 participants from three randomly selected secondary schools in Ibadan. The participants were randomly assigned to treatment and control groups. The two treatment groups were exposed to eight-week training in cognitive behaviour and rational emotive behaviour therapies, while participants in the control group received no training. One validated instrument: School Drug Abuse Rating Scale (DARS) as used and four hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. Data were analysed using Analysis of Covariance and MCA. The results of the study revealed that there was significant main effect of treatment on the ability of student’s to overcome their drug abuse challenges (F (3,116) = 6.613, p < .05).Also, the findings indicated that Cognitive Behaviour and Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapies were effective in effecting a behavioural change in students with challenges of drug abuse. Likewise, the result further revealed that there was no significant difference in the main effect of age between (younger and older); gender (male and female) on the drug abuse act of student participants. Also, the three way interaction effect of treatment with age and gender was not significant. Therefore, school authorities should adopt the two interventions as to effectively manage the challenging issue of drug abuse among secondary school students’ in school
Keywords: Age, Cognitive behaviour therapy, Drug Abuse, Gender, School, Student, and Ibadan., rational emotive behaviour therapy