Effectiveness of Group Games on Social-Emotional Skills of Children between 7 To 8 Years Old Suffering from Down Syndrome in Ahvaz
Author(s):
Article Type:
Research/Original Article (دارای رتبه معتبر)
Abstract:
Background
Down syndrome is one of the problems that children suffer from. This syndrome has been widely taken into consideration by clinical specialists and Psychologists. Children with Down syndrome are very sensitive to aspects of their social environment. Children with Down syndrome show high levels of social - emotional problems compared to normal children. Therefore, alexithymia is one of the potential problems in people with Down syndrome which is referred to disability in cognitive processing of emotional information and regulation of emotions. Several methods have been introduced to improve the socio-emotional skills of children with Down syndrome, including group game therapy. It seems that the game process leads to socialization, increases confidence and learning in children. For this purpose, this study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of group games on socio-emotional skills of children with Down syndrome.Material and
Methods
This research was a pilot project and a pretest-posttest type with experimental and control group. The experimental and control groups were equal; random sampling and a pre-test was executed on both groups before applying the experimental interventions on experimental and control groups followed by a post-test at the end of intervention. The difference between pre-test and post-test in each group was evaluated in terms of statistical significance. Statistical population of this study included all 7-8 years old children with Down syndrome in special schools of Ahvaz city in the academic year of 2012- 2013. The statistical sample in this study was 30 children (16 girls and 14 boys) with Down syndrome. In this study a multi-stage random sampling method was used so that two schools were selected first among district 2 of educational zones in Ahwaz and among schools located in district 2. After the diagnostic assessment finally 30 students from first and second grade elementary, aged 7-8 years were selected and randomly assigned into two experimental and control groups. In order to investigate the effectiveness of group games on social-emotional skills of children with Down syndrome the Social-emotional skills Bostin questionnaire (2007) was used.This questionnaire which was developed by Bostin in 2007 consists of 50 questions and measures five dimensions of behavior (skills, self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, social relations and adaptive behavior. The questionnaire scale is five-point Likert and all the questions are directly scored. It is notable that this questionnaire has not been already used in Iran and it is the first time translated and used in this study. It was also found after investigating that the validity and reliability of each of the subscales of the questionnaire is desirable. Furthermore, the games of (relaxation-learning, animals power game, news reading game, Patchwork humor, Secret, throne, poping balloons, the pyramid of glasses, Volleyball with loop, creating a country, the creative coloring) were used to evaluate the effectiveness of play therapy.
Results
The results showed that performing program group games affect social and emotional skills and increase the level of skills in children with Down syndrome in socio-emotional skills (Skills, self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, social and adaptive behavior) (p
Conclusion
The results showed that using group games is a way to increase social and emotional skills in children with Down syndrome. Group gaming has been instrumental in improving and increasing the socio-emotional skills of the children and reduced the symptoms of anxiety, behavioral and emotional disorders, and increased their compatibility. Generally, the results showed that the childrens ability and skills in the areas of socio-emotional skills listed has been increased significantly after receiving game programs.Keywords:
Language:
Persian
Published:
Middle Eastern Journal of Disability Studies, Volume:6 Issue: 1, 2016
Pages:
74 to 79
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