The effect of an anxiety- coping program for children based on cognitive behavioral approach upon 4th graders' anxiety levels

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of an anxiety-coping program for children based on cognitive behavioral approach upon children's anxiety levels. The study was started with 16 students in the fourth grade of primary school. However, the the follow up measurement was conducted with 6 students in both experimental and control groups with a total of 12 students. In the study, The Screen for Child Anxiety Related Disorders (SCARED) which was adapted into Turkish by Karaceylan-Çakmakçı (2004) was used as data collection tool. In the research, students in the experimental group participated in a Cognitive Behavioral Therapy based anxiety coping program consisting of a total of eight sessions, two sessions for each week. No study was conducted with the students in the control group. A mixed design of 2x3 (experimental and control * pre-test, post-test and follow-up) was used in the study. Follow-up measurement was done six months later after the study was completed. Mann-Whitney U test was used to investigate the significance of the differences between the groups. Additionally, Friedman test was conducted to examine significant differences between measurements within groups. As a result of the statistical analysis, a significant decrease was observed in the general anxiety, general anxiety disorder, separation anxiety and social anxiety levels of the participants in the experimental group after the intervention and this decrease continued in the follow-up period. Furthermore there was no statistically significant decrease in panic disorder/somatic symptoms and school phobia levels of the participants in the experimental group. On the other hand a significant decrease was observed in just general anxiety levels of the participants in the control group. The findings indicated that the anxiety-coping program for children based on cognitive behavioral approach which was developed by the researcher was effective in terms of decreasing the anxiety levels of children.