The Effect of Life Skills Training on Social Communication of Clients Referring to Drug Abuse Clinics

Abstract

Background: The human society has long been challenged by the issue of drug addiction. Due to cultural reasons, beliefs based on wrong perceptions and unique geographical position, Iranian society is prone to drug addiction. The addicts usually have several problems in handling social and inter-personal communications, a fact that highlights the necessity of providing life skills training to these patients. Objectives: The study is an attempt to determine the effect of life skills training on social communication of male drug addicts who referred to Tavalod Novin Drug Clinic in Larestan, Iran. Methods: A semi-experimental study was carried out to examine the quality of social relationship of drug addicts. To this end, Piers' standard questionnaire of social relationship with 29 statements was administered before, immediately after, and one month after the intervention. Participants were 42 drug addicts in the age range of 20 -68 who referred to the drug clinic and used medicine treatment program. The intervention was consisted of seven 2-hour sessions of life skills training program. The collected data were analyzed using repeated measures analysis of variance, and Kolmogorov Smirnov (KS) test was used to check normality assumption with regard to quantitative variables. Results:Comparison of the data before, immediately after, and one month after the intervention revealed statistically significant differences in the domains of social support, depth of relationships, conflicting relationships, and total score of social relationship with parents, family members, and friends (P < 0.05). Conclusions: Given the fact that drug addicts usually have problems in their social and inter-personal relationships, life skills trainings can be effective in improving their social communication in terms of their relationships with parents, family members, and friends. Life skills training should be a part of training protocols for drug addicts.

The Effect of Life Skills Intervention on Social Self Efficacy for Prevention of Drug Abuse Among Young Adolescent Students at Benha City

“…In addition, the study of Tymes, et al [17] agreed with our study findings indicating an improvement in the children life skills behavior score post intervention compared to pre intervention. Moreover, Jahanbin et al [39] who had conducted a semi-experimental study to determine the effect of life skills training on social communication of male drug addicts who referred to Tavalod Novin Drug Clinic in Larestan, Iran. Their study findings indicated a positive significant relationship between life skills training to patients referring to drug clinics and improvement of their communication skills.…”