Master's Theses

Department

Psychology

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Abstract

The current study examined whether children can learn behaviors from fictional characters in books. Additionally, the researcher explored whether discussion of the topic at hand would improve the learning of those behaviors or if it would have no effect and reading alone can elicit change. Children in kindergarten and first-grade (n = 85) took both a pre-test and post-test about two separate topics, bullying and trying new things. They were assigned to four different groups: book only, discussion only, both book and discussion, and unrelated book. No significant differences were found between groups regarding the "trying new things" topic, whereas there were significant differences between groups regarding the "bullying" topic. The results indicate that bibliotherapy may be more effective for some topics rather than others or that children relate to characters or topics differently.

Keywords

Psychology

Advisor

Carol L. Patrick

Date of Award

Fall 2009

Document Type

Thesis

Rights

© The Author(s)

Comments

For questions contact ScholarsRepository@fhsu.edu


Included in

Psychology Commons

Share

COinS