Male youths ages 13-18 incarcerated at two minimum security detention facilities participated in a program to determine if Alfred Adler's concept of social interest could be developed through group interactions led by non-professionals.
The youths answered a self-report attitudinal scale, the Sulliman Scale of Social Interest and were rated by their classroom teachers on the Behavior Dimensions Rating Scale as pre-test measures. Volunteers from a liberal arts college sociology classes were randomly assigned to work in male-female pairs over a ten week period of time with the experimental population. These pairs led their constant group of incarcerated youths in ninety minute discussion sessions once per week for the duration of the program. Structured human relations exercises specifically designed to encourage elements of social interest; belonging, cooperation, and significance were assigned for each of the sessions. At the end of ten weeks, the youths in the experimental groups and the control population were tested again on the two scales.
The results of Pearson Product Moment Correlations Test indicated no relationship between attitude and behavior for either the experimental or control groups on the pre-test and the post-test.
A Mann Whitney U t-test indicated a highly significant increase in the social interest of the experimental group at the end of the program. While the control group showed no change over the course of the ten weeks, those who participated in the developmental groups increased their scores on the Sulliman Scale of Social Interest by an average of 12 points. Another Mann Whitney U t-test indicated that there was no difference between the social interest of Caucasian and non-Caucasian youths.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:unt.edu/info:ark/67531/metadc331687 |
| Date | 08 1900 |
| Creators | Eldridge, Connie |
| Contributors | Medler, Byron, Sininger, Rollin Albert, Berg, Robert C., 1938-, Holman, John E. |
| Publisher | University of North Texas |
| Source Sets | University of North Texas |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | v, 122 leaves, Text |
| Coverage | United States - Illinois |
| Rights | Public, Eldridge, Connie, Copyright, Copyright is held by the author, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. |
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