The effect of individual psychology based social interest development psycho-education program on social interest in adolescents

The main purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of the Individual Psychology Based Social Interest Development Psycho-Education Program on social interest in adolescents. For this purpose, a 2x3 experimental design consisting of three measurement points (pre-test, post-test, and follow-up) and two groups, (experimental and control) was utilized. The second aim of this study is to develop a valid and reliable measurement tool to measure social interest in adolescents. A total of 810 adolescents participated in the scale development process. Exploratory Factor Analysis was performed to determine the construct validity of the Social Interest Scale for Adolescents and Confirmatory Factor Analysis was performed on a different study group to evaluate the construct validity of the resulting model. As a result of this study, to measure the social interest levels of adolescents, a measurement tool consisting of 21 items and four sub-dimensions, namely "Belonging, Sensitivity, Coping, and Helping", was obtained. Within the scope of the main purpose of the research, 32 students in two different groups, experiment (16 students), and control (16 students). In the study, data were obtained by Personal Information Forms, Social Interest Scale for Adolescents. Depression Scale for Children was applied in Exploratory Factor Analysis and; Adolescent KA-Sİ Empathic Tendency Scale was applied in Confirmatory Factor Analysis within the scope of a criterion-based validity. Within the scope of the research, 10-session Individual Psychology Based Social Interest Development Psycho-education program was applied to the students in the experimental group, and no intervention was performed until the experiment process and follow-up test application was completed in the control group. During the research process, pre-test before the experimental process, post-test after the experimental process, and follow-up test measurements were utilized at the 12th week following the end of the experimental process. The Parent Observation Form was applied to the parents of the participants in the experimental group as pre-test and post-test. In data analysis, the "Friedman's Test" "Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test", "Mann Whitney U" were used to determine the difference between the pre-test, post-test, and follow-up measurements of the groups, and the data were analyzed using the SPSS 25 program. As a result of this study, it was obtained that the Individual Psychology Based Social Interest Development Psycho-education Program applied in the experimental group increased the total social interest, belonging, sensitivity, and helping levels, but no significant difference was found in coping level. Also, it was found that there was a significant difference between the experimental group and the control group about the total social interest and belonging post-test scores of the students. In line with these results. It can be said that the Social Interest Scale for Adolescents is a valid and reliable measurement tool in determining the social interest levels of adolescents and that the Individual Psychology Based Social Interest Development Psycho-educational program is an effective program for developing the total social interest levels of students. Results obtained from the study were discussed in the context of the relevant literature and suggestions were presented to practitioners, researchers, and policymakers.