NCJ Number
85325
Date Published
1980
Length
226 pages
Annotation
This book presents procedures for implementing a program of 'structured learning,' a psychoeducational intervention designed to enhance the prosocial, interpersonal, stress management, and planning skills of aggressive, withdrawn, immature, or developmentally lagging juveniles.
Abstract
The array of interventions currently used for adolescents -- incarceration, probation, individual and group psychotherapy, other group approaches, and a number of behavior modification efforts -- are reviewed, followed by a discussion of four particularly effective procedures for skill training; modeling, role playing, performance feedback, and transfer of training. Detailed instructions for conducting a structured learning group are then provided, including discussions of organization, trainer preparation, and a step-by-step procedural accounting of the modeling role, play-performance, feedback-transfer training sequence. The subsequent chapter describes the development and implementation of techniques for selecting and grouping youth to enhance their skill acquisition through structured learning, followed by a chapter on the behavioral steps that constitute each skill. The detail of an initial session and the management of various problems and resistances that may arise during structured learning sessions are then discussed. The concluding chapter presents the results of a prescriptive research program that evaluated the effectiveness of structured learning. This points to further research relevant to the treatment of adolescents. An annotated bibliography of 80 listings and about 190 references are provided.