The Effect of Group Work on the Self-Efficacy of Social Work Students

Abstract

The oldest social work education institution of Turkey is Hacettepe University Department of Social Work. One of the most important goals of the Theory of Social Work 2 course given in this department is to improve the application skills of students. Thus, a group work is conducted with voluntary students throughout this course where the instructor functions as a facilitator. In this group work, students are expected to develop an insight and self-awareness of themselves. The present study aimed at determining the effect of group work on the self-efficacy of the 2(nd) grade students receiving social work education. The group work was constructed on the basis of creating awareness for them to know themselves. Therefore, the pretest-posttest comparison group design was employed. The general self-efficacy scale was used as the pretest tool and the posttest tool. Based on the said design, 46 students (12 people constituting the in-group and 34 people constituting the out-group) were included in the study. A group work lasting 6 weeks was conducted with the in-group. The out-group, on the other hand, only observed the group work, and took notes. Then the differences between the scores obtained by the in-group members before the group work and the scores obtained by them after the group work were examined, and the differences between the in-group and the out-group score averages before and after the group work were analyzed. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.