Effectiveness and Feasibility of a Stress Management Program for Third Grade Children
Hutchison, Susan Mordini
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Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/68905
Description
Title
Effectiveness and Feasibility of a Stress Management Program for Third Grade Children
Author(s)
Hutchison, Susan Mordini
Issue Date
1983
Department of Study
Education
Discipline
Education
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Education, Elementary
Abstract
To ameliorate the negative effects of anxiety on learning in the school setting, anxiety management programs have been developed and utilized with positive results with special needs students under special conditions. Since all school children are potential victims of the negative effects of anxiety, a systematic investigation of the effectiveness and the feasibility of a stress management program in the regular classroom and instructed by the classroom teacher was needed.
From volunteers, three third grade teachers and their students were selected to participate in this investigation. Two of the teachers were assigned to teach the Stress Management Program, a six-week program of daily lessons which involved skill training in muscular relaxation, breathing techniques, guided fantasy, self-talk, tension awareness, structured reinforcement, generalization, and maintenance activities. The third teacher was assigned to use the placebo treatment Break-Time, a program emphasizing divergent processing activities.
The dependent variables included: ability to relax, teacher ratings of achievement-related behaviors, student's self-report of anxiety, generalization of relaxation skills, and attitude of teachers and children toward the program. The independent variables were class membership and special education services membership. The changes on the dependent variables were measured from pre- to post-test, and on some variables, to follow-up. A multivariate analysis of variance revealed significant differences by class membership and no significant interaction between class membership and special education services membership. A multiple discriminant analysis indicated that membership in the treatment classes could be best predicted by decreases in external blaming behavior and externally reliant behavior, both related to poor academic achievement.
The other major findings relating to the problem were that the trained students generalized the use of their relaxation-related skills, and both students and teachers held a positive attitude toward the program. The conclusion was that a stress management program is both feasible and effective when taught by the classroom teacher in a regular classroom, assuming a teacher who is convinced of the importance of the program and who is willing to allow adequate class time for the learning, maintenance, and reinforcement of the skills.
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