Effectiveness of an online learning intervention to develop psychosocial competencies

Modern technology has provided more opportunities for teenagers to experience new things. As a result, teenagers are more vulnerable for abuse and health problems in particularly for teenage pregnancy. To minimize this issue, Health Organizations have started conducting workshops with the intention of empowering teenagers with knowledge, attitude and safety skills required to prevent pregnancy. However, teenagers seem reluctant to show their interest for studying about sexuality and talk about their issues openly. Therefore, health organizations emphasize the importance of identifying an innovative and personalized strategy to develop psychosocial competencies in teenagers. Since information and communication technology has proven to bring benefits for education through online learning technologies, the present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of an online educational intervention to develop psychosocial competencies required to prevent teenage pregnancy. Data were gathered through interviews, questionnaires and focused group interviews from a group of female adolescents. The findings imply that psychosocial competencies can be improved better through an online intervention than a classroom-based intervention and it suggested that delivering lessons using videos, games and discussions might probably be well accepted by the adolescents. According to the findings, several paper prototypes were developed and evaluated. Based on the results of the prototype evaluation, an online intervention was developed. The final product was evaluated in a true experiment. The results of the study could be interpreted as the online intervention was successful in achieving psychosocial competencies among adolescents. Further the findings of the present study signified that the psychosocial competencies can be developed among the teenagers using videos, games and discussions as instructional aids or approaches.