E. F. AKINSOLA, P. A. UDOKA
number of those brought up under the combination of the three
parenting styles namely the permissive/authoritarian/authori-
tative parenting style hybrid. Next in number is the children
brought up by authoritative parents. The significant representa-
tion of the children brought up under the authoritarian/authori-
tative parenting style in this study agrees with earlier findings
(Akinsola, 2010, 2011) that this parenting style hybrid is sig-
nificantly and commonly practiced in Nigeria. One important
observation is the fact that in the earlier studies (Akinsola, 2010,
2011) in which young people served as the participants au-
thoritative parenting recorded the highest frequency of partici-
pants followed by the authoritarian/authoritative parenting.
However in this study, where children served as participants,
the authoritarian/authoritative parenting hybrid recorded the
highest frequency of participants. The implication here seems
to be that as Nigerian children grow up and mature, they tend to
perceive their parents more as authoritative and less as authori-
tarian.
The findings of this study as depicted in (Table 3) suggest
that permissive parenting tend to promote the highest level of
social and performance anxiety in the children when compared
to the levels of anxiety being promoted by other parenting
styles and the levels of anxiety reported by the total sample
(Table 3). Though this tendency was not statistically significant,
it was significant that children brought up under the permis-
sive/authoritarian parenting style reported the highest level of
performance anxiety. These findings reflect the contribution of
parental psychosocial education embedded in parenting styles
to the development of social anxiety in Nigerian children, and
the fact that all types of parenting style promote anxiety in
children raised under them, with authoritative parenting pro-
moting the least anxiety and permissive parenting promoting
the highest level of anxiety in the children. The influence of
parenting styles on social anxiety in children demonstrated in
this study also reflect societal attitude to shyness and cultural
dimension of parental socialisation of Nigerian children. The
traditional Nigerian society believes that children are to be seen
and not heard and as such child training method promotes ti-
midity and shyness in the children.
Psychodrama was found to be effective in reducing anxieties
in the children who went through therapy. This finding agrees
with the findings of Hall (1977), White et al. (1982), and Car-
penter, & Sandberg) (1985). Hall, (1997) found the intensive
weekend psychodrama experience effective in significantly
reducing feelings of anxiety, depression and distress in nurses,
while White et al. 1982, found psychodrama effective in modi-
fying child abusing mothers’ attitude and in improving their
self control and socialisation. Carpenter, & Sandberg, 1985, in
their own research, found psychotherapy effective in improving
ego strength and in developing social skills in delinquent ado-
lescents. The present finding further confirms the effectiveness
of psychodrama in reducing social and performance anxieties
and promoting public appearance confidence. Of note is the fact
that the children who went through psychodrama therapy were
not clinical samples. However given the success of the therapy
it can be confidently inferred that psychodrama therapy can be
effective in reducing anxieties in Nigerian clinical samples. In
addition some cognitive restructuring of the children’s feelings
about the objects or situations provoking fears or anxieties in
them was carried out. It is therefore suggested that it is needful
to combine psychodrama therapeutic approach with cognitive
restructuring to ensure effective and enduring outcome of psy-
chodrama therapy.
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