Comparing the efficacy of training social-emotional skills and training social problem solving on social competence in female single parent, second period high school students

Social competence refers to an individual's ability to do things related to his or her personal independence and social responsibilities, leading to normal social growth and the establishment of positive and constructive relationships. Emotional-social skills training plays an important role in feeling more socially competent and efficient in the day-to-day responsibilities and life challenges of single-parent girls. Research has shown that social problem-solving training increases social competence in adolescence and adulthood.

The aim of this study was to compare the effectiveness of Social-Emotional skills training and social problem-solving training on social competence of single-parent female students in the second year of Sarab high school.

The present study is a quasi-experimental study with a pretest-posttest design with a control group. The statistics of the present study include all female high school students who were studying in the academic year 2019-2020. The research sample of 45 students was selected by multi-stage cluster sampling method and randomly assigned to two experimental groups and one control group. The sample individuals completed the social competency questionnaire of Felner, Lease & Phillips (1990) first as a pre-test stage and after 12 sessions of Social-Emotional skills training (Sadri Damirchi et al, 2009) and 10 sessions problem-solving training (Montazer et al, 2020) of 90-minute as a group for a group. Experiments were re-evaluated in the post-test phase of all three groups. Data analysis was performed by univariate analysis of covariance using SPSS-24 software.

The results of this study showed that social-emotional skills training and social problem solving increased the social competence of effective single-parent female students (p <0.05). On the other hand, there was no significant difference in the effectiveness of social-emotional skills training and social problem solving in the social competency variable (P <0.05).

Teaching adolescents’ socio-emotional skills and social problem-solving skills leads to the formation of social interactions between him and the outside world, the management of emotions, and thus the increase and improvement of a person's social competence. For this purpose, it is necessary for specialists and family psychologists to provide training in this field to students and their parents.