Abstract
The present study examined the effects of classroom-based social skills education on junior high school students' self-reported social skills and their subjective adaptation, including stress responses, school stressors, social support, loneliness, and tendency to refuse to go to school. Participants in the study were 133 seventh graders. The social skills education program, presented in 8 sessions over 6 months, focused on 7 target social skills: how to introduce oneself, how to invite classmates, how to give positive messages, how to ask classmates to cooperate, how to respect others, how to reject unreasonable demands skillfully, and how to control one's emotions. On the basis of a cluster analysis on the pre-during-post scores of selfreported social skills, participants were divided into 4 groups: (a) decrease,(b) increase from low to high,(c) high, and (d) increase from high to higher. The students whose social skills scores increased from low to high had decreased loneliness scores and increased scores for social support from friends. On the other hand, the students whose social skills scores decreased had increased irritation-anger scores. These results suggest that the classroom-based social skills education program implemented in the present study improved the students' social skills and their subjective adaptation to some extent.
