Improving Empathy and Communication Skills of Visually Impaired Early Adolescents through a Psycho-education Program

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of an interpersonal communication skills psychoeducation program to improve empathy and communication skills of visually impaired adolescents. Participants of the study were sixteen early adolescents schooling in an elementary school for visually impaired youth in Diyarbakir. The study has a factorial design having two groups (treatment and control) and three measures (pre-test, post-test and follow-up test). Empathy levels of the participants were measured by KA-SI Empathic Tendency Scale for Children and Adolescents, and communication skills were measured by Communication Skills Evaluation Scale. While the participants in treatment group were exposed to interpersonal communication skills training for nine sessions, members of the control group did not receive any treatment. After the completion of group sessions, post-test measures were obtained. Data were analysed by mixed between-within subjects analysis of variance. Analysis indicated effectiveness of the psycho-education program in increasing empathy levels and communication skills of the visually impaired adolescents.