effectiveness of social skills training on adaotive functioning and emotional-behavioral disorders in students

the aim of the present study was to examine the effectiveness of social skills training via cognitive-behavioral approach on adaptive functioning and emotional-behavioral disorders in students. The design of the study was experimental with pretest-posttest control group and two months follow-up. Thirty school girls of 5th and 6th grades with emotional-behavioral disorders were selected by random multilevel clustering from Langrood city in 2012-2013 academic year. The participants were randomly assigned into experimental or control groups. In order to assess the adaptive functioning and emotional-behavioral disorder in students, the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001) was used. The experimental group received the Walker Social Skills Curriculum (Walker, 1983) for 17 sessions during two months. Repeated measures ANCOVA was used to analyze the data. The results indicated that there was a significant difference between experimental and control group in adaptive functioning and emotional-behavioral disorders during post-test and follow-up. The findings suggest that the social skills training should be considered as a complementary part of school educational program.