THE EFFICACY OF COGNITIVE BEHAVIOURAL THERAPY IN REDUCING SOCIAL ANXIETY BASED ON SEX AMONG SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN EDO STATE

This study investigated the efficacy of cognitive behavioral therapy in reducing social anxiety among secondary school students in Edo State. Three research questions guided the study while three null hypotheses were formulated. This study employed a pretest-posttest non-equivalent control group design, a quasi-experimental research design. The target population comprised all 47,695 public secondary school students in Edo State. A multi-stage sampling procedure was utilized to select a sample of 120 students. This study employed an adapted version of the Social Phobia Inventory (SPIN) developed by Connor et al. (2000). This adapted instrument, titled the Social Anxiety Assessment Scale (SAAS), was tailored by the researcher to suit the study's context. To determine the internal consistency of the SAAS, the Cronbach's Alpha statistic was calculated, yielding a reliability coefficient of 0.88. Data analysis involved both descriptive and inferential statistics. Specifically: descriptive statistics to answer the research questions while the null hypotheses were tested using one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The hypotheses were tested at 0.05 alpha level of significance. The findings revealed that cognitive behavioral therapy was efficacious in treating social anxiety of secondary school students. More so, it was found that there was no interaction effect of treatment on social anxiety due to sex of students. Based on the findings of the study, it was recommended amongst others that schools should run periodic awareness campaigns on mental health issues such as social anxiety. These campaigns should aim at destigmatizing mental health concerns and encouraging students to seek help early