Effects of Bibliotherapy on the Self-Concept of Learning Disabled,Emotionally Handicapped Adolescents in a Classroom Setting

Abstract

Learning disabled, emotionally handicapped adolescents maintain poor strategies for coping with exigencies of environment. Attempts to gain direct access to these problem areas for remediation often result in a defensive withdrawal and reinforcement of maladaptive techniques in dealing with stress. Bibliotherapy offers a method through which adolescents can observe parallel stresses at an affective distance and incorporate change without a direct threat to personal independence. The present study employed bibliotherapeutic techniques for two of four groups of learning disabled, emotionally handicapped adolescents. Administration of the Piers-Harris Children's Self-concept Scale shows a change in mean postintervention self-concept for the two groups under the bibliotherapeutic condition. Implications are discussed.