EFFICACY OF TOKEN-ECONOMY AND TIME-OUT TECHNIQUES IN REDUCING AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIOUR AMONG STUDENTS OF FEDERAL UNITY SCHOOLS

(A CASE STUDY OF KANO AND KATSINA STATES, NIGERIA)

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Author

Presented To

Department of Education

ABSTRACT
This study investigated the efficacy of token-economy and time-out techniques in reducing aggressive behaviour among students of Federal Unity Schools in Kano and Katsina States-Nigeria. The study used non-equivalent pre-test, post-test control group of quasi experimental design. The population of the study was six hundred and seventy one (671). The study was conducted on a sample of sixty (60) selected students with aggressive tendencies from three Federal Unity schools in Kano and Katsina states (Federal Government College Daura Federal Government College Kano, and Federal Science Technical College, Dayi). The instrument used for data collection was Aggressive Behaviour Scales. The data generated were analyzed using mean, standard deviation and t-test. The hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. Based on the findings of the study, hypotheses one, two, three and five were rejected while hypothesis four was retained. The results of the study revealed that Token-economy and Time-out techniques are effective in reducing aggressive behaviour of the respondents in favour of the experimental groups (t-value = 23.985 and 23. 878, p = 0.000 and 0.000) respectively. Token-economy technique was also found to be more effective than Time-out technique in reducing students aggressive behaviour (t-value = 2.173, P = 0.036) in favour of the Token-economy technique. The result further showed that, there was no gender difference in the effectiveness of Token-economy technique in reducing aggressive behaviour of respondents; hence the technique had almost similar effect for both male and female students (t-value = 1.021, P=0.064). Gender difference was found in the effectiveness of Time-out technique in reducing aggressive behaviour of respondents. The difference is in favour of female students (t-value = 3.408, P = 0.003). Based on the research findings, it was recommended that teachers, School administrators, psychologists and counsellors should be exposed to Token-economy and Time-out techniques in re-addressing students with aggressive behaviour.