Effectiveness of play therapy in enhancing social skills in Intellectually disabled children

Abstract

Objective: The present study was targeted to measure the effectiveness of play therapy in enhancing social skills in pre-diagnosed intellectually disabled children of mild and moderate level. Methodology: The research comprised of ten intellectually disabled children of mild and moderate level of ages 5-15 from Army Special Education Academy Rawalpindi. Social skills were considered as dependent variable, whereas play therapy as independent variable in this study. The method of this research was quasi, pre-test and post-test type with an experimental and control group. Social Skills Checklist (Heather Thomas, 2013) was administered in pre-test and post-test. It was hypothesized that play therapy on experimental group will be effective as it will produce significant positive results in enhancing social skills as compared to the control group. Result: The analysis included paired sample t-test and findings were presented in tabulated form. Paired sample t-test of experimental group and control group pre and post-test showed significant difference in pre-test and post-test scores. Conclusion: The current study will help in understanding the use of play therapy to facilitate children with intellectual disability and it will bridge the gap between the mental health needs of exceptional children and the available services.