The Effectiveness of Psychodrama on Emotional Expression and Social Competence of Adolescents with Social Anxiety

The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of psychodrama on emotional expression and social competence in adolescents with social anxiety. The present study was a semiexperimental method with a pretest-posttest design with a twomonth follow-up. The study population includes all-female high school students in Isfahan with social anxiety. 30 adolescents with social anxiety were selected by the purposive sampling method. To collect data from adolescent social anxiety questionnaires Lajerka’s Emotional expression of King and Emmons and Social Competence Zhu and Ji were used. The treatment was Psychodrama with 10 sessions of treatment and each session. Repeated measure analysis of variance was used to analyze the obtained data. The results showed that psychodrama is effective on the components of emotional expression. Also, psychodrama treatment is effective on all components of social competence and this result was confirmed. This effect on positive and sincere emotional expression and social competence has been stable in the follow-up period. Psychodrama should be considered as one of the appropriate psychotherapies for expressing emotion and promoting social competence of socially anxious students with adequate time setting by educational and psychological administrators and agents