EFFECTS OF RATIONAL-EMOTIVE BEHAVIOUR THERAPY (REBT) ON SELFISH BEHAVIOURS AMONG IN-SCHOOL ADOLESCENTS IN RIVERS STATE

ABSTRACT

The  study  investigated the  effects  of  Rational-Emotive Behaviour  Therapy on selfish behaviours exhibited among in-school adolescents in Rivers State of Nigeria. The research design is Experimental, Non-equivalent Pretest-Posttest Control Group Design. Rivers State is made up of twenty-three Local Government Areas. The overall population of the study is 5,681 – the total number of all the SSll students in Port Harcourt and Emohua Local Government Areas. The target schools (Uniport International Secondary School, Nkpolu-Port Harcourt and Government Secondary School, Emohua) used for the study have a population of 293 SSll students. The sample is 144 SSll adolescent students who were selected through stratified random sampling: they met the criterion for high level of selfishness, because they scored 60.0 points and above in the measurement scale, and thus were chosen for the study. ‘Students Selfishness Survey Inventory’ was designed and used to determine student’s level of selfishness. A 40-item questionnaire entitled,

‘Adolescent Selfish Behaviour Scale,’ which is a modified four-point Likert scale, was designed and used for data collection. The reliability of the instrument was determined through Pearson’s Products Moment Correlation Co-efficient (r). A stability co-efficient of 0.71 (r=0.71) was derived. Six research questions and five hypotheses guided the  study.  An  interval rating scale,  mean  ()  and  standard deviation (SD) were used to respond to the  research questions, while Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 alpha level of significance. The pre-test mean of the study reveal that: the level of selfishness among  in-school  adolescents  is   high;   Rational-Emotive  Behaviour  Therapy treatment drastically reduced the level of selfish behaviours among in-school adolescents; there is a significant difference between the mean response of adolescent students from urban area and those from rural area to treatment. Gender difference  did  not  significantly influence  Rational-Emotive Behaviour  Therapy (treatment). The general implication of the study’s findings is that there is urgent need for the educational sector and guidance counsellors to step up action and embark on strategies that would encourage prosocial and mutual caring behaviour among adolescent students in other to combat selfishness. The study recommends regular adoption of Rational-Emotive Therapy procedures by school administrators/heads, teachers, parents and other authority figures to solving adolescents’ behavioural, social, academic and moral problems, with the expertise supervision of Rational-Emotive therapists. The study also recommends extensive application of Rational-Emotive Therapy procedure in a single or combined form with other techniques to effectively combat various adolescent problems. Finally, Education Ministry should massively train and make available Rational-Emotive therapists in the school system.

CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION

Background of the study

This study is based on the background that selfishness, which has to do with thinking and acting to please oneself other than others, is a pandemic behavioural and social malady with attendant stress on interpersonal relationship and personality dent; nobody wants a selfish person as friend. Selfishness is a seeming evil that is common among all gender, classes and races of humanity. Children from two years and upward have shown signs of selfishness. Teenagers, adolescents as well as adults are also prone to manifesting selfish tendencies in their daily social, family and personal lives and in their decision-making.

Selfishness sounds like a congenital disease, since people of different age groups do behave selfishly at one time or the other. Selfishness is fundamentally a psychological, personal-social and a psychosocial issue.  On this same subject-matter, selfishness, Benedict xvi (2009:1), opined in a world meeting with families in January, 2009, thus:

The educational task of the family is made difficult by a deceptive concept of liberty, in which whims and the subjective impulses of the individual are exalted to the point of leaving each one locked within the provision of his own “I” (cited in Fitzgibbons,2009:1).

There is a clear indication of selfishness at the background when adolescent students engage in acts of insubordination, fighting, examination malpractice, cheating, stealing, robbery, expressing superiority or inferiority complex, domineering and jealousy and are incapable of adhering or adjusting to  school  rules  and  regulations,  societal  norms  and  acceptable  code  of

conduct; these, consequently, engender psychosocial and psychological manifestations such as anxiety, moodiness, depression, irritability, and other forms of personality disorders. A selfish person often would want things done in his own way or done to suit his interests, or he will be ready for a conflict.

Selfishness  makes  students  see  themselves  as  competitors  rather  than work in collaboration and cooperation with each other. This situation can create acrid competitors rather than friends or a team. A selfish person could sometimes be aggressive and vindictive, because he insists on having his own way. This hampers friendly relationship and healthy competition which is ideal atmosphere for learning experiences among students, and subsequently makes the teacher’s task more strenuous. In the words of Martin Luther King Jr. in Brainyquote.com (2010, p.1), “every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.”

A situation where some bright students would not study together with other less-bright students from the same class, or when a bright student fails to  help  a  less-intelligent  student  to  solve  an  academic  problem  is  an expression of selfishness, with a tinge of pride. There are instances where some smart students would not be willing to help less-smart ones with some points they missed out when the teacher was dictating notes. When students are cooperative, knowledge spreads faster. Sometimes, dull students can turn to be noisy and disturbing in the classroom thereby creating non-conducive learning atmosphere for the studious classmates. According to a write-up on Wikipedia.com (2007), selfishness as a concept as well as a behavior pattern is the practice of concern with one’s own interest in some sort of priority to

the interests of others.

Selfishness is a maladjusted behaviour pattern. Selfishness is a behaviour pattern which is concerned with the practice of giving unpopular and often irritating attention to someone’s interests in some kind of undue priority as against the interests, benefits and rights of other persons. It is anti- social and can taint the personality of anybody who is involved. A selfish person or student thinks craftily because he seeks his own interests first and all the time; he would always look for whom or what to blame for his failure to gain an advantage. In Brainyquote.com (2010), Napoleon Hill is quoted as saying that “Great achievement is usually born of great sacrifice, and is never the result of selfishness.”

Let us consider a case where a female graduate from one of the towns in the Eastern part of Nigeria got married to a wealthy school drop-out from the same locality. She was denied access to public work and rather told to sit at home, take care of the home and children. The spouse’s pretext was that after all, how much will public work fetch her in comparison to breeding and taking “adequate” care of the children at home? On the contrary, the man is afraid that other men may start to nurse feelings for his beautiful wife. The wealthy business man grows in experience and knowledge of business and social life as he interacts daily with people outside his home, but shuts out his graduate wife from the need to harness and utilize her potential outside her home too, despite her protest. This is a selfish denial of one’s fundamental right.

This researcher observed yet another case of apparent selfishness in a situation where religious rite confines a married woman for a long period of time in separation from the public in some parts of Northern Nigeria, when the spouse goes to attend to his daily tasks, routine and social responsibilities.

The married woman should be able to enjoy some rights and freedom as well as the spouse. According to Smith, Voorhees and Morris (2004), selfishness is an undue regard or exclusive care for one’s own interest, comfort or pleasure, regardless of the happiness, and often of the rights of others. Barnhart (1996) describes and defines selfishness as caring too much for oneself and too little for others. He further stated that a selfish person puts his own interests first. Hawker and Hawkins (1991) posit that selfishness has to do with being acquisitive,  avaricious,  covetous,  demanding,  egocentric,  egotistical, grasping, greedy, inconsiderate, mean, mercenary, miserly, self-centred, self- indulgent, self-interested, self-seeking, thoughtless, and ungenerous.

In   Googles.com   (2007),   selfishness   is   defined   as   mankind’s fundamental defect. It further states that the only thing necessary to change heaven into hell – if God were to allow it – is selfishness. Gladstone, a British Amazon (cited in Google cache, 2007) is quoted as saying, thus: “At the root of every problem is selfishness.” Pope John Paul II remarked in Fitzgibbons (2009:1) that “Selfishness in all its forms is directly and radically opposed to the civilization of love.”

Fitzgibbons (2009) stated that:

Selfishness is one of the major causes of excessive anger and defiant behaviours in children and in teenagers. In our practice it is the leading cause of the angry behaviours in children. Selfishness in children  regularly creates serious stress in parents, in siblings, in peer relationships and in educators. The identification of this conflict is essential in addressing the excessive anger in children. These children can be misdiagnosed as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder because of their hyperactivity at times, particularly when they do not get their own way or the attention they desire (p.1).

In a scientific report, Thomson (2006) writes that some recent research outcome conducted by Sarah-Jayne Blakemore – a cognitive neuroscientist – do suggest that teenagers/adolescents are prone to being more selfish than adults, because they use a different part of their brain to make decisions compared to adults. There is an increase in connections between nerves in the brain when children reach adolescent age of puberty. This occurs particularly in the area involved in decision-making and awareness of other people’s feelings, called the “mentalising network.”

Therefore, selfishness has to do with self-centeredness, self-giving and feelings of self-importance, given that people are capable of acting in agreement with their own personal values and perceptions which are evident in their decisions. Finally, this researcher posits that selfishness is prioritizing one’s personal interests to the conscious or unconscious disregard/neglect of others’  interests.  Selfishness  is  a  behavioural  flaw  with  attendant  serious moral and social consequences.

In the South-South geopolitical zone of Nigeria, especially Port Harcourt area and the adjoining communities, especially the riverine, there have been cases of youth restiveness and militancy. The reasons for their agitations, as shown in a study conducted by God’spresence (2010) among a group of 54 residents of Port Harcourt and its environs who are drawn from different walks of life, is that these youths simply felt that they have not been carried along in matters of decision-making that involve their communities which directly or indirectly have bearing on their own lives as citizens. They also felt that their leaders (community, state and national) have been swimming in affluence to the abysmal neglect of the interests of the younger generation (God’spresence, 2010). Some youths exhibit selfish behaviours when they go to  the  extent  of  vandalizing  oil  pipelines,  kidnapping  and  taking  people

hostage and turning round to demand huge ransom in exchange for their victims. Sometimes, there are instances of cult group activities/clashes, stabbing, rape and prostitution, illegal possession of light arms, illegal use of drugs and narcotics among students in some schools in the area, as observed by the researcher. According to Okaba (2004:126-127)

the issue of resource control has been a perennial one which has made youths in the Niger Delta to resort first, to kidnapping of expatriates, and the demand for huge ransom to release their victims. This was not given adequate attention and has escalated to the kidnapping of stakeholders in the Niger Delta who probably should have spoken for social justice on behalf of the frustrated youths. The youths have heard stories probably from the media or leaders about the preferential treatment given to the Northerners in the areas of good roads and access to educational opportunities at some levels plus other benefits which the oil producing areas do not enjoy (as cited in God’spresence,2010:90).

This researcher hereby posits that unhealthy individualism would be the result when “I”, “self,” and “more of self” is enthroned. This translates into self-centeredness, self-importance, self-love, self-indulgence, self-pity, self- interest and self-aggrandizement, among others. All these and similar manifestations are selfish behaviours. “What you believe will determine how you behave” is an axiom which readily comes to bear in the life of a child who,  for  instance,  is  groomed  in  a  high  economic  profile  environment, because this child will ultimately display class distinction behaviour among a mixed group in the process of social interaction. This researcher has made personal observations in nine out of ten occasions where teenagers and adolescents go out on picnic as a group, and at party times. The exemption has  been  in  instances  where  the  group  goes  out  on  school-organized

excursions in which some economically high profile children prefer to move together with the ‘lows’ that are intelligent; this posture may have some underpinning selfish considerations.

Selfishness can manifest in such practical forms as cheating others or indulging in examination malpractice, stealing a fellow student’s notebook, hoarding of relevant educational information or materials, among others. According to Wikipedia.com (2007), selfish acts also include littering a place, obstructing public pathways, neglect of public road traffic signs thereby hindering other road users or endangering their lives, and monopolizing the use of or access to public facilities.

It is therefore the apparent display of selfish acts such as cheating, lying, mischief making, fighting and stabbing one another over girlfriend/boyfriend   and   other   related   matters,   hoarding   of   important academic information and materials, unwillingness to discuss class work together, stealing, and exam malpractice among students in the schools from the chosen area of this study that made this  researcher particularly interested in conducting this study in which Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET) would be applied to deal with the malady (selfishness). The researcher’s informal interactions with some school-age adolescents in both the urban setting of Port Harcourt metropolis and the rural setting of Emohua localities did reveal that selfish behaviours/acts are exhibited by adolescent students of both sexes.

As a result of this prevalent situation, this study focuses attention on the application of Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET) procedures in the treatment of ascertained cases of selfish behaviours among in-school adolescents. This is to determine its therapeutic effect in curbing selfishness, which by implication is a culmination of irrational thoughts and feelings that are braced up with negative and retrogressive self-verbalizations. According

to Corey (1991:342) Rational- Emotive Therapy (RET) has been widely applied to the treatment of anxiety, hostility, character disorders, depression, sex and love problems, marriage and child-rearing problems, and to adolescence, social-skills training and self-management issues. The efficacy of Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET) in dealing with adolescent problems makes the adoption of the therapy for this study worthwhile.

As  stated  in Corey (1991), “the basic assumption of this cognitive approach (Rational-Emotive Therapy) is that people contribute to their own psychological problem as well as specific symptoms, by the way in which they interpret events and situations in their life.” Rational-Emotive therapy (RET) is a therapy developed by Albert Ellis, which emphasizes the discovery of clients’ irrational beliefs (Watson, 1992). According to Corey (1991), it all started in 1955 when Albert Ellis combined humanistic, philosophical and behavioural therapy, to form Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET), after having understudied psychoanalysis critically and arrived at the conclusion that it was a relatively superficial and unscientific form of treatment. According to Parham (1988), irrational  thoughts or assumptions are believed to be the source of abnormal functioning. Albert Ellis, an American clinical psychologist, opined that an aggressive approach (verbal attack) works best in getting a client to break through defences, to confront his or her thinking, and to develop more rational patterns of perceiving and thinking.

Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET) is a cognitive approach to psychotherapy. It is highly didactic, very directive and concerned as much with  thinking  as  with  feeling. Rational-Emotive  Therapy is  based  on  the assumption that cognitions, emotions and behaviours interact significantly and  have  a  reciprocal  cause  and  effect  relationship.  Rational-Emotive Therapy  adopts  a  multimodal  and  eclectic  approach  to  psychotherapy.

Perhaps, the oldest cognitive behaviour therapy is Rational-Emotive Therapy

(Corey, 1991:326).

Rational-Emotive Therapy is based on the assumption that human beings are born with a potential for both rational, or straight thinking, and irrational, or crooked thinking. People have predispositions for self-preservation, happiness, thinking and verbalizing, loving, communion with others, growth and self-actualization. They also have propensities for self destruction, avoidance of thought, procrastination, superstition, intolerance, perfectionism and self-blame, and avoidance of actualizing growth potentials (Corey, 1991).

REBT adopts a systematic way of exposing irrational beliefs that result in emotional and behavioural disturbance (Ellis, 1986b; Wessler and Wessler,

1980) RET’s basic hypothesis is that our emotion stem mainly from our beliefs, evaluations, interpretations and reactions to life situations. According to  Ellis  (1987b),  virtually  all  people  are  born  with  the  ability  to  think rationally; nevertheless, we also have strong tendencies to escalate our desires and preferences into dogmatic, absolutistic “shoulds,” “musts,” “oughts,” demands, and commands. If we stay with preferences and rational beliefs, we will  not  become  inappropriately  depressed,  hostile,  and  self-pitying.  It  is when we live by demands that we disturb ourselves. Our unrealistic and illogical  ideas  create  dysfunctional  behaviours.  Ellis  (2011:3)  opines  that when people strongly desire to achieve or avoid something, their wishes and wants frequently (and unhealthily) escalate into needs or necessities.

Ellis (1988) posits that absolutistic cognitions are at the core of human misery, because most of the time these beliefs impede and obstruct people in the pursuit of their goals and purposes. “We create, both consciously and unconsciously, the ways we think and, hence, the ways we feel in a variety of situations.”  According  to  Ellis  (2011:22-23),  Rational-Emotive  Behaviour

Therapy principles and practice teach that “someone can maintain emotional stability and well-being in life by consistently following these three important basic philosophies, namely: unconditional self-acceptance, unconditional other-acceptance, and unconditional life-acceptance.”

Rational-emotive therapy utilizes cognitive restructuring to change faulty or irrational thoughts that result in negative emotions especially anxiety, depression, anger and guilt. REBT is based on the premise that negative emotions and accompanying maladaptive behaviours result directly from maladaptive thoughts and only indirectly from precipitating external events; although people attribute their emotional upsets to the external events. Ellis therefore concluded that such irrational beliefs as “I must be loved by everyone,” “the idea that it is horrible when things are not the way one would like them to be,” and “the idea that one needs something other than oneself on which to rely” are the root of most emotional disturbances (Liebert and Spiegler, 1990:496).

According to Corey (1991), through the rational-emotive therapeutic process clients learn skills that give them the tools to identify and dispute irrational beliefs that have been acquired and are now maintained by self- indoctrination. They learn how to replace such ineffective ways of thinking with effective rational cognitions. The therapeutic process allows clients to apply REBT principles not only to a particular presenting problem, but also to many other problems in life or the future ones they may encounter. The focus is on “working with thinking and acting rather than primarily with expressing feelings.” Therapy is seen in REBT as an educational process.

Rational-Emotive   Behaviour   Therapy   (REBT)   can   be   utilized   by therapists in helping the client to identify the particular maladaptive self- statements someone is making concerning some external precipitating event.

The researcher deduces from the propositions of Rational-Emotive Therapy that the therapist’s role is to point out the irrational or illogical beliefs of clients on which the self-statements are based and goes on to dispute them or challenge the validity of those beliefs with such confrontational statements as: “who says so?” “Why do you think you must be perfect to be accepted?” “Who says everyone must love you?” In incisive terms, Burger (1990) quotes Albert Ellis as saying, “virtually all people are born with very strong tendencies to think crookedly about their important desires and preferences.” This assertion introduces us to the issue of selfishness among in-school adolescents which is the major focus of this study.

It is also important to point out one important observation made by the researcher in the course of this study: it is that many youths in the areas covered by this study are not really educated and meaningfully engaged. This is contrary to the provisions of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (2004:8) in the National Policy on Education, Article 9 (a) of section 1, which stipulates that:

Education shall continue to be highly rated in the national development   plans   because   education   is   the   most important instrument of change; any fundamental change in the intellectual and social outlook of any society has to be preceded by an educational revolution (p.8).

The  dynamics  of  urban-rural  divide  is  important  in  understanding aspects of people’s behaviour that is attributable to environmental factors. As far back as 1887 a German sociologist, Ferdinand Tonnies, did contrast social relations among members of rural communities to those of people in urban locations of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, respectively. The study noted that members of rural communities (Gemeinschaft) have common ancestry, values, traditions, aspirations, roles, activities, common histories and frequent face to face relations that foster strong social and emotional bonds among

them, and that relationship among urban dwellers (Gesellschaft) tend to be very superficial and interactions impersonal since very often they come from different backgrounds with differing values, norms and attitudes (Calhoun, Light and Keller, 1995).

According to Milgram (1970), another German sociologist, George Simmel, opines that people in the urban areas tend to develop a blasé attitude toward what is going on around them, which results in their being cold, heartless and indifferent to the feelings and actions of others. He noted that this development is in sharp contrast to the mutual concern and caring attitude typical of people in small towns of the countryside. Nonetheless, Stark (2004:562) argues that although mass society theorists did argue correctly that lack of attachments results in deviance and anomie, research has also shown that people typically maintain close attachments even in the largest cities… for instance, people in the cities do not join social movements because they are loose marbles bouncing randomly in normless cities, but because they are attached to persons who already belong to the movement.

Daniel Hart from Rutgers University and Suzanne Fegley from Temple University, U.S.A. did a research in 1995 on how adolescents who are distinguished by remarkable caring and prosocial behaviour understood themselves and their world. The study investigated a group of urban minority adolescents, African-American and Hispanic, in an economically distressed Northeastern city. The sample was arrived at by contacting social agencies, church leaders, schools and youth groups. A comparison group of adolescents was matched for age, gender, ethnicity, and neighbourhood. The latter adolescents were also well adjusted, attended schools regularly, and many of them were also involved in volunteer activities, but not as the caring group. These investigators, Hart and Fegley (1995), found as anticipated, that the

caring adolescents understood themselves quite differently than did the comparison adolescents. They were more likely to describe themselves in terms of their values and ideals (Cobb, 2001:606).

The different ways whereby people interpret events and situations in their lives is more evident in their gender. According to Annis (2003:44), scientists and researchers have discovered that males and females think differently, process information differently, and communicate differently. For instance, women are stronger in verbal spatial skills, while men are stronger in spatial tasks. These differences can be seen in boys and girls as they grow older – especially when they are in school.

Annis (2003:45) further noted that “sociologists have observed that even at a young age, little girls already have an inclination towards building relationships  and  building  rapport  with  others.  Girls  seek  to  include newcomers   in   their   groups,   while   boys   are   relatively   indifferent   to newcomers. Boys tend to be individualistic and competitive. They establish a pecking order in groups, and spend their time deciding who is better at what, rather than making sure everyone is included. Girls spend their time chatting in little groups, while boys push each other around and make a lot of noise. It is as if girls live according to the slogan: ‘We are together in this,’ while boys’ motto seems to be: ‘Life is a contest.’”

To this effect, it is good to understand the nature of adolescent as this will serve as a precursor to appreciating their problems with selfishness. Adolescence, according to Colman (2003), is the period of development from the onset of puberty to adulthood. Seifert and Hoffnung (1991) define adolescence as the stage of development that leads a person from childhood to adulthood –marked by the major physical changes of puberty and important cognitive and social changes; it is generally considered to begin around the

age of 12 and to end about the age of 20. In their own contribution, McCandless and Coop (1979) defined adolescence as a stage of identity development often filled with considerable role experimentation and rebellion against standards of parents in favour of those of peers. Dahlbäck,  Makelele, Ndubani, Yamba, Bergström and Ransjö-Arvidson, (2003:49) note that “adolescence is a period of transition during which a person is neither considered a child nor an adult, and that little is known about adolescent boys’ perceptions, norms, role models and gender relations that influence their male identity and behaviour.”

Borkar (2010:1), made his view known when he said that:

adolescence  is  one  of  the  most  confusing  times  in  a person’s life. It is that period when they don’t know how they are supposed to feel and act. There are traits of both an adult and their childhood present in them and that is why behaving like either, or both, gets very confusing for them.  In  addition  to  that,  puberty  brings  in  raging hormones  that  confuse  them  further.  Along  with  the physical changes that herald in adolescence, there are several behavioral changes that can be commonly seen as a part of adolescent behavior (p.1).

The behavioural changes noticeable among adolescents include a) Need for   Independence:   If   one   looks   at   the   adolescent   psychology   and development,  the  most  noticeable  behavioural  change  that  parents  will witness in their children is their need for space and independence. They no longer depend on their parents for every small need and they assert this in every possible manner; b) Need to Belong: Adolescents will begin to realize that there is a world outside their own home and there are people of their own age groups as opposed to just their parents. This age will therefore bring in a pattern where they have an intense need to be with people from their own age group. Making new friends becomes very important in this age. And more

important is the need to belong and be accepted into a group and to feel a part of that setup. The fear of being lonely and the need to be with friends is so strong  that  many  fall  victim  to  peer  pressure  and  are  likely  to  take  up smoking, drinking and sometimes even destructive behaviour like vandalism; c) Rebellion: This is one of those behaviour traits that is used almost as a synonym with adolescent behavior. But it is not a necessary or a compulsory trait that dominates all adolescents. Rebellion is only an adolescent’s way of trying to assert his independence and identity. They start thinking, rationalizing, questioning and analyzing things and they no longer listen and accept everything that their parents say at the first time. Adolescent behaviour can be a very tricky business to follow for parents and teens themselves. However, knowledge of adolescent behaviour helps all those involved to be better  prepared  for  dealing  with  behavioural  changes  effectively  (Borkar,

2010).

Chauhan (1984) noted that human beings are creatures of feelings or emotion, and that emotions control human behavior; and further stated that adolescent period is marked by heightened emotionality, and that heightened emotionality is evident from nail biting, tension, conflicts, quarrels with parents, sibling and classmates. Camerer (2003), observed that while the impact of social preferences on economic behaviour has been analyzed extensively and by now is quite well understood for adults   much less is known for children and adolescents.  Studying potential changes of social preferences when children and teenagers grow up is interesting because it reveals insights into how social orientations originate, how they evolve with age and how they interact with relevant socioeconomic and background variables such as gender or the number of siblings. In their views, McNeal (1992); Dauphin, El Lahga, Fortin, and Lacroix (2010) opine that knowing

more on the economic behavior of children and adolescents is also relevant in itself because children have become more and more important as economic decision makers and consumers in their households. Finally, identifying potential changes in social preferences when humans grow up provides an indication on possible interventions in education that might help to prevent conflict in interactions of people (children) of different age or of different gender.

This study is made more interesting as it revolves not just around adolescents,  but  on  adolescents  who  are  currently  in  secondary  schools; school drop-outs are excluded. This particular choice is necessary because outcomes of selfish behaviours among students in relation to academic pursuit and general learning atmosphere are implicated in the study. Furthermore, in- school  adolescents  are  distinguished  from other  adolescents  by reason  of opportunities for informed learning, and educational enlightenment, which are affordable within academic environment.

This researcher, therefore, posits that ‘adolescence is the bridging phase of an individual’s development that lies between childhood and early adulthood,   often   marked   by   heightened   emotionality,   exuberance   and strength, which can precipitate unwelcome   behaviours that result from psychological and physical growth process. An example of such unwelcome behaviours   is   selfishness   among   in-school   adolescents,   which   has concomitant stress problems on peer, family and sibling relationship, coupled with poor learning outcomes with its ricocheting impact on the entire society: this is a critical reason for this study. Equally, adolescence can be a period of outstanding achievements, fulfillment, goal attainment and self-actualization when it is properly handled and harnessed.’

Statement of the problem

The spirit of self-centred competition, inordinate goals to excel and to dominate has led many people to develop selfish life style. Selfish behaviours among students would adversely affect student-to-student and student-to- teacher relationships. Besides, cheating, deceit, insubordination, truancy, stealing, fraud and other defiant behaviours are indicators of the presence of selfishness, which altogether could mar the goals of education in Nigeria. Most  students  get  alienated  when  an  individual  attempts  to  satisfy  his personal interests and do not take into consideration the interests and rights of others. This situation gives rise to conflicts, quarrels or violent reactions from fellow  students  who  feel  cheated  or hurt  by the  individual  who  behaves selfishly. This cantankerous state, no doubt, sets in motion a non-conducive abd retrogressive learning atmosphere.

Seeing that selfish behaviours of some students such as hoarding academic information, creating noisy atmosphere in the classroom, telling lies against fellow students, discriminatory study group habit, bullying, cheating in exams, unfaithfulness to one’s friends, refusal to work hard but at the same time  scheming  to  make  it  by  unfair  means,  stealing  a  fellow  student’s notebook or textbook in order to frustrate him, insubordination to teachers and class prefects adversely affect the general learning atmosphere and expected  outcome,  the  study  focuses  on  the  use  of  Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT), which is a cognitive restructuring behavioural scientific approach in curbing selfishness among adolescents in school.

Furthermore, selfishness has continued to plague mankind like a gangrenous infection, which often results in infraction of necessary relationships: this unsavoury situation affects overall societal interests and well-being. Selfishness among school children often creates serious stress for

educators, parents, siblings, and  peers. Since Rational-Emotive  Behaviour Therapy (REBT)  has  been  found  to  be  effective  in  dealing  with  various adolescent  maladjusted  behavioural  problems  such  as  anxiety,  fighting, phobia, and such other issues like adolescent social skill and self-management matters,  can  the  application  be  efficacious  in  curbing  selfish  behaviours among adolescent students in schools? The study is meant to respond empirically to the statement of problem and the adjoining question.

Purpose of the study

The main purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of Rational- Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT) in dealing with selfishness among in- school adolescents.

Specifically, the study seeks to determine:

   level of selfish behaviours exhibited by in-school adolescents.

    effect of Rational-Emotive Therapy interventions on selfish behaviours of adolescent students.

   effect of school location on the mean response of adolescent students to

Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT).

    effect of gender on the mean response of adolescent students to Rational- Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT).

     the interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy and location on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents.

    the interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy and gender on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents.

Significance of the study

Theoretically, this study would be relevant in many ways. Psychotherapists,  counselling  psychologists,  clients  with  familiar psychosocial problems, school counselors, educators and classroom teachers and administrators, students of all ages, social workers, church pastors and leaders will benefit from this study. Rational-Emotive therapists, for instance, could advance new postulations from the result of this study. The study would have  been   successful   in   expanding   the  frontiers   of  Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy application, because the use of REBT in the treatment of selfish behaviour (selfishness) is quite a new application and an extension of the traditional or common behaviour problems such as anxiety, phobia, aggression, cheating, suicide tendency, anger and fighting, among others. On the whole, this study would have aptly replicated Rational-Emotive Therapy as a versatile scientific method with wide application potentials.

Researchers and schools of thought in the behavioural sciences and counselling psychology, child counsellors, teenage and juvenile counsellors could replicate the study in their various fields since the study is potentially useful in the treatment of children, adolescents and adults with maladaptive behaviour pattern. The result of this study could be usefully replicated in handling  some  behavioural,  communication  and  relationship  problems  in other interdisciplinary approach such as logic, moral philosophy (ethics), sociology and marital relationships.

Practically, the result of this study can be extended to handling cases of youth restiveness, hostility, self-management, marital and sexual problems, child rearing problems, and character disorders, complex problems, and could be applied as a technique to frustrate psychopathic acts. The former cases can be addressed through using the directive disputations of REBT technique to

confront  the  illogical  self-verbalizations  and  mistaken  assumptions  which belie youth restiveness and other maladjusted behaviours. The latter case of psychopath can be fairly addressed through the same REBT’s direct disputations, confrontation coupled with proximity control which has to do with repelling an action from taking place through being close to the person who  exhibits  the  undesirable  behaviour  –  especially  where  the  person adopting the proximity control is a significant person.

Classroom teachers can apply the result of this study by reproducing the process and techniques involved by this researcher in helping maladaptive students to respond better in a more rewarding manner. The teacher can use disputing interventions and other simple scientific processes of Rational- Emotive Therapy to dissuade students from behaving selfishly and, consequently, teach them to be keepers of their brothers and sisters by caring for one another in the spirit of healthy cooperation.

Furthermore,  parents  could  also  benefit  from  this  study  by  adopting simple aspects of REBT technique in conjunction with instruction technique in the day-to-day training interactions they give their wards/children, so as to deal with their self-defeating verbalizations and with any visible sign of irrational belief system at work. Parents can effectively carry out this assignment with the help of trained therapists who need to be consulted by these parents from time to time on how they could help their children to behave in a more rewarding manner.

Scope of the study

This study was specifically carried out on adolescent students who are currently in public secondary schools in Port Harcourt and Emohua Local Government  Areas  of  Rivers  State.  The  study  covers  Senior  Secondary

School Class II students from Port Harcourt L.G.A. (urban area) and Senior Secondary School Class II students from Emohua Local Government Area (rural area). The schools involved in the study are mixed schools (co- educational). Particularly, this research concentrated on determining the level of selfishness among in-school adolescents, and the effect(s) of Rational- Emotive  Therapy  (a  cognitive  behaviour  modification  approach) administration on patterns of thinking or assumptions that lead to selfishness with the expectation of controlling selfish behaviours among the target group of in-school adolescents

Research questions

The research questions that guided the study are:

1.       What is the level of selfish behavior exhibited by in-school adolescent students in Rivers State?

2.        What  is  the  effect  of  Rational-Emotive  Behaviour  Therapy  (REBT)

treatment on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents?

3.        What is the influence of location on Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy

(REBT) treatment on in-school adolescents?

4.       What  is  the influence  of gender on  the  mean  response of adolescent students to Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy treatment?

5.       What is the interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Therapy and location on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents?

6.       What is the interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy and gender on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents?

Hypotheses

The following null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study and were tested at 0.05 level of significance.

Ho1.  There is no significant difference in the mean behaviour score of selfish adolescent students treated with Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy and those not treated with Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy.

Ho2. There is no significant difference between the mean response of adolescent students from urban school and those from rural school who are equally treated with Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT).

Ho3.   There is no significant difference in the mean score behaviour change of female     adolescent students treated with Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy and that of male adolescent students who received the same treatment.

Ho4.  There is no significant interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Behaviour

Therapy and location on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents.

Ho5. There is no significant interaction effect of Rational-Emotive Behaviour Therapy  and   gender on selfish behaviours of in-school adolescents.

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