Relationship between attitude towards guidance and counseling programme and adjustment of re-admitted teenage mothers in Kenyan Secondary Schools

Abstract

Teenage motherhood is a worldwide problem with 36.4 million girls giving birth before the age of 18 years in developing world. The present study investigated the relationship between attitude towards guidance and counseling programme and adjustment of re-admitted teenage mothers in selected Kenyan secondary schools. The study employed Ex-post facto Research Design. The target population of the study was 242 readmitted teenage mothers from selected schools in Ugenya Sub County. The sample size comprised 138 readmitted teenage mothers who are integrated back to school after going through the bridge center programmes and 104 readmitted teenage mothers who are integrated back to school without going through the bridge center programmes using Simple random sampling technique. The study used questionnaires for readmitted teenage mothers to collect data. Experts from the Department of Psychology and Educational Foundation in Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology ascertained the face, construct and content validity of the readmitted teenage mothers’ questionnaires. In this study internal consistency reliability of the instruments was obtained by computing Cronbach’s alpha (α) using SPSS and a co-efficient of r= 0.783 was reported. The data from questionnaires was analyzed using inferential statistics such as Pearson correlation, and Regression analysis. The findings indicated that the relationship between readmitted teenage mothers attitude towards Guidance and Counselling and adjustment was positive moderate and significant (r = .550, n=166, p<.05). The study recommended that School principals should be entrusted to provide comprehensive programs to ensure holistic adjustment of the teenage mothers in schools.