Investigating the Effectiveness of Social Skills Training in Early Childhood in Türkiye: A Meta Analysis and Meta Regression Study

Year 2025, Volume: 12 Issue: 6, 237 - 259, 01.11.2025

Nisanur Kılıç , Gökhan Kayılı

https://doi.org/10.17275/per.25.88.12.6

Abstract

This study was conducted to examine the effect of social skills training practices applied to children in early childhood on the social skills of the children trained by using meta-analysis method. The sample consisted of data obtained from 17 independent samples representing 869 participants from master’s and doctoral studies in line with the inclusion criteria. The comprehensive Meta-Analysis software in the MAJOR package of Jamovi version 1.6.15 was used for meta-analysis. With this program, the results of 17 separate studies were synthesized, and effect sizes were determined. In addition, it was examined by meta regression analysis whether there were differences in effect sizes between the publication types and publication years of the 17 studies (before 2016 and after 2016). As a result of the analysis, the random effects model shows a value of 0.862. The analysis shows that the confidence interval varies between 0.43 and 1.28 and the significance level is p < 0.001. The fact that the effect value is 0.862 means that the Social Skills levels of the children in the experimental group increased significantly as a result of training and similar practices within the scope of the comparison of the experimental and control groups. In terms of publication type, doctoral dissertations show a larger effect size (EB=1.41) than master’s theses (E =0.690), and the confidence intervals overlap. Considering the years of publication, there are differences in effect sizes between different years (Q=88.61, df =1, p=0.024). In particular, after 2016, it was determined that it showed the strongest positive effect (EB=1.37) with a high level of residual heterogeneity (I² = 79%).

Keywords

Early Childhood , Social Skills , Social Skills Training , Meta-Analysis , Meta Regression

Ethical Statement

Approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee for Non-Interventional Clinical Research, Faculty of Health Sciences, Selcuk University (approval number 2024/270).

Supporting Institution

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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