Effects of Psychological Education

Learning Skills

Since the program of psychological education involved two outcomes, the results were divided into separate categories. At one level the students were expected to learn particular adult skills such as elementary school teaching, high school counseling, or early childhood teaching. At the skill level the question was simple: Can teenagers learn the skills that are usually taught only to upper division undergraduate or graduate students? The evaluations indicated that the high school student in each of the three classes did learn the skills. For example, in the seminar and practicum in peer counseling, the pupils learned to perform counseling responses effective communication (accurate empathy, genuineness, positive regard) at the end of one semester were higher than scores achieved by graduate students. In the classes in cross-age and nursery school teaching similar results developed. The high school students learned classroom management procedures as well as how to respond effectively to young children in a variety of trying experiences. For example, they learned how to re-channel nursery school fighting and block throwing into more constructive areas and to provide warmth and security in moments of stress. Thus, there can be no doubt that teenagers can learn to perform significant adult roles. The teenagers in the project showed that in addition to benefitting personally from these experiences, they were also an important educational resource.

Teenagers can set aside their well-known preoccupation with themselves and become an effective agent for others. In this area the most encouraging results emerged.

Personal Growth

The project stressed the importance of helping teenagers assess their experiences in adult roles. Without this opportunity, they might miss the point of the experience itself. This is something we have stressed throughout this text. Our innermost needs, values, and interests can be brought to the surface only by examining our performance in action. So too with the teenagers in the seminar.

Although the classes in psychological education all had somewhat different content (teaching, counseling, and nursery school work), all had similar effects on the teenage participants. A series of measures of personal and psychological growth and change was used to rate the experimental and the control groups. The pupils in the psychological education curriculum (the experimental group) were rated at higher levels of psychological maturity than comparable pupils in regular classes (the control groups). The experimental pupils were less stereotyped in their thinking after the experience; that is, they did not see complicated situations in simple black and white terms. The experimental classes were also rated higher on measured levels of moral maturity than the control classes were also rated higher on control classes (the Kohlberg scales were used). Finally, based on participant observation and pre-test and post-test interviews, the pupils themselves indicated that they felt more mature, more at ease with adults, better able to communicate, and more self-confident than they had felt prior to the program. Because the program, like the others mentioned, is still in an early and formative stage, the kind of evidence reported above does not prove that the curriculum works. If the trends are repeated as the program is replicated, then we can find more definite proof in these findings.

The promising findings of this program in psychological education suggest that an experience in learning under conditions of responsibility produce change and growth. If we remember that so much of a teenager’s life in school and at home is passive, and includes almost no chance for initiative, direction, and control; if we take note of the fact that the time lag between adolescence and adulthood had been lengthened to inordinate proportions, we can, perhaps, begin to understand the apathy and boredom of teenagers. This apathy is only a hallmark of the marginal status of adolescence as a stage between childhood and adulthood. The psychological education curriculum seeks to reverse this very process. Instead of delaying adult responsibility, the program encourages active participation in adult roles. The need to do and to examine the doing apparently combine to broaden the teenager’s experience. The teenager is less egocentric of self-centered as a result, and maturity seems to increase.

The Future of Affective Education

We have examined one of the major educational problems confronting the schools of this country today. There has been increasing evidence that the schools are not doing their job. Not only are schools apparently failing to produce academic competence, but they also seem to have negative psychological impacts. One result has been the recent shift in curricula focus toward affective education or courses in deliberate psychological education. In these courses, the student’s personal development becomes the primary educational objective rather than a hoped-for by-product, as in the traditional curriculum. These new programs have also emphasized classroom experiences that create personal involvement and raise issues of personal effectiveness. Students then have the opportunity to examine the meaning and the personal impact of those experiences. However, since all these programs are relatively new, it would be premature to conclude anything definitive from the findings. We hope that the tentative results will prompt further development and experimentation with new methods that will breathe new life into the day-to-day school experience. 

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Category: Psychology