EFFECT OF GROUP COUNSELLING IN REDUCING EXAMINATION MALPRACTICE TENDENCY AMONG SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN IMO STATE, NIGERIA

This study investigated the effect of group counselling in reducing examination malpractice tendency among secondary school students in Imo state, Nigeria. Two research questions were answered and two null hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance guided the study. The pre-test post-test control group quasi-experimental design was adopted for the study. The target population of the study was 2326 (1096male and 1230female) SS2 students that had examination malpractice tendency in all public secondary schools in Ngor-Opkala Local Government Area of Imo State as identified through their pre-test scores. The sample of this study consisted of eighty-four (84) students from two co-educational secondary schools selected through purposive sampling technique.Students Examination Malpractice Tendency Questionnaire (SEMTQ) was the instrument used for data collection. Data collected from the study were analysed using mean and ANCOVA. Results obtained from the study revealed that group counselling was significantly effective in reducing examination malpractice tendency among the participants. The results also indicated that group counselling was more effective in reducing examination malpractice tendency among female students than their male counterpart. The researchers recommended among others, that Guidance Counsellors should adopt group counselling as an effective intervention strategy in fighting the menace of examination malpractice in secondary schools, and that the government should provide school counsellors with proper in-service training programmes to enable them acquire adequate group counselling kills in other to discharge their duties more effectively.