Effects of Systematic Desensitization and Study Skills Counselling Therapies on Test-Anxiety in Physics Among Senior Secondary School Students in Jalingo, Taraba State
The study was conceived with the major objective of investigating effects of systematic desensitization and study skills counselling therapies on test-anxiety in physics among senior secondary school students in Jalingo, Taraba State, Nigeria. Quasi-experimental research design of non-randomized pre-test/post-test control group was adopted for the study. Purposive sampling technique was used to select a total of seventy-two (72) SS II students comprising of 36 males and 36 females who were found to be anxious and had poor achievement in physics. The study consisted of four groups: three treatment groups and the control group. Each of the treatments was carried out in six sessions. Two research instruments were used for the study and they were: Test-Anxiety/Study Skills Questionnaire (TAQ) and Physics Achievement Test (PAT) which were used for pre-test and post-test. Four research hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The hypotheses were tested using ANCOVA statistics at 0.05 level of significance. The results from the data analysis led to the rejection of the first three hypotheses while hypothesis number four was retained. The findings of the study revealed that systematic desensitization therapy (SDT), study skills counselling therapy (SSCT) and the combination of the two therapies (SDT/SSCT) were effective in the treatment of test-anxiety. The study also revealed that SDT/SSCT combined treatment was more effective than the other two techniques in controlling the disorder. Having discovered the effectiveness of the counselling therapies on test-anxiety, it was concluded that although effects of test-anxiety in physics and poor study skills are enormous, effective counselling can successfully control the behaviour problem of test-anxiety and poor study skills. It was thus recommended that authorities in the educational systems should take it as a priority to train school counsellors in the use of systematic desensitization and study skill counselling thera
